Asylum

Johnny  Cairo  is  known  as  the  Scaremaster.  He  works  for
Fear  Asylum,  his  father’s  traveling  haunted  house,  and
makes  his  living  terrifying  people.  But  Johnny  has  never
frightened easily himself. That is, until he wakes up in the
middle  of  the  night  and  finds  his  best  friend’s  younger
brother in his bed. Naked.

Johnny’s fought against his attraction to Brennan for years,
worried that giving in to it will lead to losing the friendship
he shares with Brennan’s older brother, Eddie. As much as
he fights it, though, the lure of having Brennan in his bed
proves  too  hard  to  resist.  They  start  an  affair  that’s
supposed  to  be  no-strings-attached,  but  Johnny’s
persistent  denial  of  the  growing  feelings  between  them
leads  to  a  rift  that  might  not  be  mendable.  Then  an
accident at Fear Asylum nearly costs Johnny the one thing
he holds dear, and he learns that while his nickname might
be  the  Scaremaster,  he  knows  next  to  nothing  about  real
fear.

Published by Piping Hot Books

This  is  a  work  of  fiction.  Characters,  places,  and  incidents
are  products  of  the  author’s  imagination  or  are  used
fictitiously.  Any  resemblance  to  actual  events,  locales,  or
persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond
the intent of the author.

Asylum © 2013 Piper Vaughn

All  rights  reserved  worldwide.  The  unauthorized
reproduction  or  distribution  of  this  copyrighted  work  is
illegal.  No  part  of  this  book  may  be  reproduced  or
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Help  support  authors  by  purchasing  only  authorized
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Cover Design © 2013 L.C. Chase

http://www.lcchase.com

Edited by Samantha M. Derr

http://smderr.blogspot.com

Content Warning: This work is classified as a gay (M/M)
romance. It contains graphic language and sexual content
between two adult men. Not intended for anyone under
the age of 18.

Acknowledgments

Thank you to all my beta readers, my editor, Sam, and my

cover artist, L.C., for putting together a cover I’m

extremely proud to have represent my book.

Dedication

For Terry Milien, whose awesomeness knows no bounds.

Chapter One

It was raining the first night it happened. The

steady  gush  of  water  from  the  gutters  had  almost  lulled
him  to  sleep  when  something  jostled  onto  the  mattress
next  to  him  and  he  felt  the  warmth  of  a  body  against  his
back. Soft lips brushed the shell of his ear. “Johnny?”

“Hmm?” Johnny stirred drowsily, his brow

furrowed in confusion. The next second, he recognized the
voice  and  his  eyes  snapped  open  wide.  “Brennan?”  He
shifted onto his back to try to get a look at the person lying
in  bed  next  to  him.  In  the  faint  glow  coming  from  the
muted television across the room, he could just make out
Brennan’s  features.  Wide  amber  eyes,  pert  nose,  lush
mouth. “What the hell are you doing?”

Instead of answering, Brennan pressed close to his

side, one of his hands slipping under the blankets. His hair
was damp against Johnny’s cheek, his fingers cool. Johnny
felt them brush over the tautness of his bare abdomen.

“Hey! Do you realize where your hand is?”
Brennan smiled slowly, his lips quirking up into an

impish little grin. “Yeah.”

Johnny glared at him. “So move it.”
“I intend to.”
And he did, his fingers sliding under the waistband

of  Johnny’s  boxers  and  curling  around  his  semi-stiff
erection.  Brennan  stroked  him  with  easy,  unhurried  skill,
his  mouth  at  Johnny’s  throat,  sucking  up  a  dark  mark  on
the pale skin, his confident touch enough to leave Johnny
shuddering and breathless with shock.

Asylum

Johnny tried to tell himself it only happened that

first time because of how long it took him to overcome his
initial  surprise.  By  the  time  he’d  recovered  some
semblance  of  reason,  he  was  on  the  verge  of  coming,  his
body strung tight, thighs trembling. There was no stopping
it then. His orgasm washed over him in pulsating waves of
ecstasy,  and  Bren  was  there,  leaning  down  to  flick  his
tongue  across  one  of  Johnny’s  pebbled  nipples,  his  eyes
gleaming  with  satisfaction  and  more  than  a  hint  of
mischief.

As Johnny lay there trying to recover, lids grown

heavy  in  the  aftermath,  he  felt  the  bed  shift  and  heard
Brennan release a soft moan. He turned onto his side, eyes
widening  when  he  realized  that  Brennan  was  stroking
himself  off,  right  there  next  to  Johnny,  his  hand  moving
over his shaft at a languid pace, occasionally pausing so he
could rub his thumb across the moisture that had beaded
at the tip.

Johnny knew it was wrong to watch. Hell, it was

wrong  for  him  to  want  Brennan  the  way  he  did.  He
couldn’t  have  Brennan,  couldn’t  risk  all  the  complications
that  might  arise.  But  he’d  wanted,  so  much  and  for  so
long.  His  desire  had  become  a  tangible  thing.  And  the
moment  seemed  so  surreal,  as  if  it  were  happening
somewhere  other  than  the  here  and  now,  in  a  place
shrouded  in  living  shadows  and  back-dropped  by  the
sound  of  rain.  Nothing  short  of  a  gun  to  his  temple  or  a
natural disaster could have made him look away.

Brennan glanced over, met his gaze. Johnny’s cock

stirred at the hunger he saw in that look. Then Brennan’s
eyes flicked down and he smiled again. “Like what you
see?”

Johnny wanted to deny it, but he couldn’t hide his

body’s obvious reaction. So he said nothing. Brennan

Piper Vaughn

didn’t seem to expect him to. His eyes lifted and this time
he  held  Johnny’s  gaze.  In  his  periphery,  Johnny  could  see
Brennan’s arm moving faster. He wanted to look, to watch
Brennan’s hand moving over his rigid flesh, watch him pull
and  tug  at  his  cock  until  he  came,  but  he  wasn’t  sure  if
anything  would  have  been  hotter  than  Brennan’s  face  at
that  moment.  His  eyes  were  dark,  cheeks  flushed,  lips
parted,  his  expression  one  of  anguished  bliss.  Because  it
felt  good.  Unbearably  good.  And  Johnny  could  see
Brennan  wanted  to  drag  it  out,  make  it  last,  but  it  was
building,  that  ultimate  release,  rising  too  quickly  for
Brennan  to  control  despite  how  much  he  might  have
wanted to.

“Do it,” Johnny whispered. “Let it go.”
Brennan bit his lower lip, his eyes fixed on

Johnny’s. “Kiss me.”

Johnny didn’t even think about saying no. He

leaned forward, his fingers twining into Brennan’s hair and
jerking him closer. Their mouths met, and Brennan opened
for  him,  welcoming  him  with  a  moan  as  Johnny’s  tongue
slid inside. Johnny kissed him hard, licking, sucking, biting.
Within  seconds,  Brennan  started  shaking,  keening  into
Johnny’s mouth as he finally gave in to his orgasm. Johnny
pulled  away  so  he  could  watch,  eyes  drawn  to  the  pearly
white cum that had spattered across Brennan’s chest and
stomach.  He’d  leaned  down  for  a  taste  before  he  fully
realized what he was doing, his tongue dragging across the
rippled muscles of Brennan’s abdomen.

Brennan trembled beneath him, fisting a hand in

Johnny’s hair to pull him back up for another kiss. Johnny
let  him  do  it,  knowing  Brennan  could taste  himself  on  his
tongue, his fingers digging into Brennan’s hips. He tugged
Brennan  close,  pressing  their  bodies  so  tightly  together
Johnny  could  feel  his  every  breath.  They  kissed  that  way,

Asylum

deep and slow, hands exploring, touching, stroking, until
sleep overtook them both.

Johnny woke to find Brennan still in bed with him,

one  of  Brennan’s  toned  arms  flung  casually  across  his
chest.  For  a  moment,  he  got  caught  up  in  admiring  the
lines  of  Brennan’s  long,  lithe  body  in  the  gray,  predawn
light. His skin was naturally tan, the color of coffee with a
generous dollop of cream. Johnny had always been partial
to  men  with  nice  skin  and  Brennan’s  complexion  was
perfect,  silky  smooth  and  clear.  He  especially  loved  the
way  the  warm  brown  color  complemented  Brennan’s
dark-lashed amber eyes.

He was reaching out to brush a hank of wavy black

hair  off  Brennan’s  forehead  when  he  suddenly
remembered  himself.  His  hand  flew  back  and  he  jerked
upright in bed, filled with such complete and utter horror
the sensation nearly made him choke. He was in bed with
Brennan.  Brennan.  His  best  friend’s  younger  brother.
Someone who was so totally off limits Johnny had crushed
any  feelings  of  attraction  toward  him  with  swift  and
certain brutality whenever they’d surfaced in the past. But
he hadn’t given a thought to any of that during the night.
Daylight brought with it the memories of what he’d done,
what  he’d  permitted,  and  every  single  reason  why  it
should never have happened.

Brennan groaned, rolling onto his back in his sleep,

and Johnny gave him a none-too-gentle slap on the
shoulder. “Get out.”

Brennan woke with a grunt, blinking groggily.

“Wha’?”

“Get out,” Johnny repeated.
“Huh? Why?”
“Because you shouldn’t have come here in the first

place.”

Piper Vaughn

“John—”
“Out!”
Brennan scrambled out of bed and bolted from the

room without a backward glance, slamming the door shut
behind him.

Johnny lay back against the pillows and ran

trembling fingers through his short, spiky hair. Shit. What
had gotten into him? He should have sent Brennan packing
the moment he realized who was in his bed, but it’d been
so long since he’d had a hand on him that wasn’t his own.
As true as that was, though, it was still an excuse, one he
knew Eddie wouldn’t easily forgive.

Fuck. He was supposed to be looking out for

Brennan,  not  kissing  him,  not  letting  the  kid  give  him
handjobs.  Well,  he  wasn’t  a  kid  anymore,  was  he?  And
that  was  the  problem.  Brennan  had  just  turned  twenty  a
few months back. Still too young to legally drink, but way
beyond  the  age  of  consent.  And  Johnny  had  noticed.  Oh,
yeah, he’d noticed. He’d been noticing ever since Brennan
hit  puberty  and  went  from  a  gawky  preteen  to  a  poised,
athletic young man. But he wasn’t supposed to be noticing
those kinds of things, not about Brennan. He’d known the
kid since he was in sixth grade for crying out loud.

Johnny groaned and closed his eyes. Whatever had

happened—demonic possession? temporary insanity?—it
couldn’t happen again. It was never going to happen again.
He pushed the incident from his mind, got dressed, and
went upstairs for breakfast.

Cameron, one of his longtime friends and co-

workers,  stood  at  the  stove,  flipping  pancakes.  His
boyfriend Dean leaned against the counter next to him, a
mug  of  coffee  in  hand.  They’d  been  speaking  in  whispers
before  Johnny  entered  the  room,  but  went  quiet  the

Asylum

moment he stepped inside. Dean straightened and smiled
at him.

“Want some coffee?” he asked. “I just finished

making it.”

“Sure, thanks.” Johnny accepted a fresh cup of

coffee from Dean with a grateful smile. “Mmm, do I smell
bacon?”

Cameron grinned at him over his shoulder. “You

know it.”

“Anyone else awake yet?”
“Nope. Well, except for Bren, but he just grabbed

some juice and went back downstairs. Looked like he
might be sick or something.”

Johnny strove for a casual tone. “Oh, really? That

sucks.” Cameron flicked a quick glance at him, one that
said he wasn’t buying Johnny’s attempt at nonchalance for
a second, but he didn’t say anything, just went back to
turning the pancakes. Johnny cleared his throat and went
to the fridge to grab the half and half. “So, opening night
tonight. I think everything should be good to go.”

“Not worried at all,” Dean said as he plopped into a

seat at the table. “We’re a well-oiled machine. By now we
could do this stuff in our sleep.”

Cameron chuckled as he started stacking the

finished pancakes on a platter. “Glad you’re so confident. I
always get a little nervous when we set up in a new city.”

Johnny seated himself at the table across from

Dean and sipped at his coffee. “I’m with Dean. Been doing
this way too long to be nervous. We’ll have them terrified
and eating out of our hands. Word of mouth will spread
quickly. Always does.”

“Hmm. Well, you are Johnny Cairo. The

‘Scaremaster’. Maybe you’re wasting your talent here with
us lowly carnies.” Cameron set the platter of pancakes,

Piper Vaughn

along  with  another  of  crispy  bacon,  on  the  table  and
leaned  down  to  drop  a  kiss  on  top  of  Dean’s  head.  Dean
looked  sideways  at  him  and  reached  up  to  draw  a  finger
along  the  curve  of  his  jaw,  giving  Cameron  a  slow,
secretive  smile  that  made  Johnny  feel  a  little
uncomfortable,  as  if  he  were  somehow  intruding  on  a
private moment.

“Ah, I come from a long line of carnie stock,” he

said to cover his discomfort. “It’s in the blood, Cam.”

Cameron laughed. “Yeah. There is no escape for

you, I suppose.”

Johnny shrugged. “I’m happy where I am. I get to

travel the U.S. and scare the shit out of people for a living.
What’s there to complain about? I could think of plenty
worse jobs.”

“Ain’t that the truth?” Dean smirked. “I’ve worked

a few of those myself.”

“Well, you’ve found your calling. And tonight the

people of Chicago won’t know what hit them.”

“That’s right.” Dean’s grin widened as he dug into

the stack of pancakes and dropped a couple onto his plate.
“Fear Asylum is officially open for business.”

* * *

For all of Johnny’s boasting earlier, it wasn’t easy

running  a  successful  haunted  house.  There  had  to  be  a
hook, something to lure people to Fear Asylum instead of
one  of  the  multitude  of  other  haunted  houses  available
during  the  month  of  October  in  any  given  area.  As
Halloween  approached,  these  things  popped  up  like  flies
at  a  picnic,  with  every  Mo,  Dick,  and  Larry  thinking  he
could slap a few decorations up in his garage, put  a mask
on, and make a quick buck scaring the neighborhood kids.

Asylum

Fear Asylum was a full-scale operation. They had a

permanent  staff  of  twelve  and  set  up  in  a  different  state
every year, renting out old warehouses and hiring the rest
of  their  crew  from  the  local  applicant  pool.  In  the  off
season, they joined up with traveling carnivals and stuck to
the warmer southern states. Thanks to Johnny, they had a
substantial  online  following.  His  father,  Albert,  had
conceived  the  idea  back  in  the  ’70s,  but  he  wasn’t
computer-savvy  and  had  relied  solely  on  word-of-mouth
advertising  for  decades.  Several  years  prior,  he’d  finally
passed  the  responsibility  of  marketing  on  to  Johnny.  In
addition to setting up a Web page, Johnny had used every
social networking site he could think of to get their name
out there.  His hard work had paid off and the last couple
of years had been their most profitable to date.

Johnny hoped the trend would continue. He knew

they were good at what they did, namely terrifying the hell
out of everyone. Instilling fear was part of his family’s M.O.
His father’s idea of sneaking an anonymous staff-member
or  two  into  each  group  of  guests—Infiltrators,  he  called
them—had  been  ingenious,  really.  The  Infiltrators
sabotaged  the  group  from  within,  increasing  paranoia,
making  the  situation  seem  that  much  more  real  for  their
customers.  By  the  end  of  the  tour,  one  or  both  of  the
“guests” would have met with a gruesome demise or been
dragged off into the darkness, screaming all the while, and
the remainder of the group stumbled out of the exit, pale,
wide-eyed, and scared shitless. Most times they would run
to a crew member, babbling about someone getting killed,
but occasionally they bolted as if they expected something
from inside Fear Asylum to follow them out. Johnny found
those instances to be particularly gratifying.

That first night in Chicago was one of their biggest

openings ever. An hour before they started letting people

Piper Vaughn

inside,  the  line  was  already  wrapped  around  the  building
and halfway down the block. Johnny knew then that every
member  of  the  staff  would  stay  busy  until  they  finally
locked the doors and shut down. Those were the nights he
loved  best.  The  excitement  seemed  to  seep  into  his  very
bones and keep him constantly amped. It was the kind of
energy that best lent itself to their performances.

Johnny nodded subtly to Brennan when Bren

walked in at the tail end of the first group. Bren had gone
out earlier to mingle with the crowd and stand in line as if
he were a regular customer. The people he was with had
no idea he was actually on staff, which was exactly the
way Fear Asylum wanted it.

Bren acknowledged Johnny's nod with a slight

smirk  and  then  shoved  his  hands  into  his  pockets  and
huddled  into  his  hoodie.  No  one  in  his  group  paid  him
much  attention  as  they  purchased  their  tickets and  made
their way through the entrance, but they would notice him
soon  enough.  Brennan  was  one  of  Fear  Asylum's  best
Infiltrators, probably because he seemed so harmless and
boy-next-door. Johnny and Bren were impressive to watch
whenever they got assigned to a group together, but being
the  strongest  two  Infiltrators  on  staff,  that  rarely
happened  anymore,  and  it  certainly  wouldn’t  be
happening  that  night,  not  with  the  crowd  they  had.  As
Johnny suspected, they stayed busy until they were finally
forced  to  cut  off  the  line  half  an  hour  after  they  were
scheduled to close.

After shutting down the warehouse and making

sure the building was clear, they drove back to the house
they  were  renting,  tired  but  still  thrumming  with  restless
energy  and  self-satisfaction  after  such  a  successful  night.
Brennan  sat  in  the  passenger  seat  of  Johnny’s  Dodge
Challenger,  his  head  bobbing  along  to  the  bass  from  the

Asylum

heavy  metal  song  that  blared  from  the  speakers.  At  one
point,  he  glanced  over  and  met  Johnny’s  gaze,  his
expression eager and happy, a broad, easy smile stretching
his  mouth,  and  it  was  almost  as  if  the  previous  night  had
never  happened.  But  then  Johnny’s  eyes  dropped  to  the
long  fingers  tapping  out  a  rhythm  on  Bren’s  thigh  and  he
remembered how it felt to have them wrapped around his
cock. Suddenly, the back of his neck burned and he felt like
everyone  else  in  the  car  somehow  knew  what  had
happened between them.

When they arrived at the house, Johnny bypassed

the kitchen, which was where the crew usually gathered to
chitchat  and  munch  on  snacks  before  bed,  and  headed
directly  downstairs  to  his  room.  The  two-story  bungalow
had  a  total  of  six  bedrooms,  including  two  small  single
rooms  in  the  finished  basement.  Whenever  they  found
themselves  in  a  situation  where  single  rooms  were
available,  they  drew  straws  to  decide  who  would  be  the
lucky crew member to get a room to himself. This time, he
and  Brennan  had  won  the  draw,  leaving  the  other  ten
crew  members  to  pair  up  in  the  bedrooms  on  the  upper
levels.

Johnny took a quick shower in the Jack and Jill

bathroom  that  connected  his  room  to  Brennan’s  and
collapsed  into  bed  in  his  boxers.  He  fell  asleep  within
moments,  not  even  contemplating  that  there  might  be  a
repeat of the events from the night before until the creak
of  the  bathroom  door  woke  him  several  hours  later.  The
room  was  nearly  black,  lightened  only  by  the  sliver  of
moonlight  filtering  in  from  the  small  window  above  the
bed,  but  he  could  hear  Brennan’s  approach  through  the
darkness  and  the  telltale  rustle  of  clothes  being  shed.  He
stayed  completely  still,  watching  with  half-closed  lids  as
Brennan slid onto the mattress beside him.

Piper Vaughn

The second Brennan had settled against the

pillows,  Johnny  pounced  on  him,  rolling  Brennan  onto  his
stomach  and  gripping  both  of  his  wrists  in  one  hand.
“What  the  fuck  are  you  doing,  kid?”  he  growled  into
Brennan’s ear. “I don’t want you in here. I thought I made
that clear this morning.”

Brennan shivered beneath him, his voice a bit

breathless when he answered, “I’m not a kid. And you do
want me here, Johnny. Under you, just like this.”

Johnny wasn’t sure how it happened. Brennan

shouldn’t  have  been  able  to  manage  it,  what  with  the
death-grip  Johnny  had  on  his  wrists,  but  somehow
Brennan  got  his  hands  free  and  turned  to  face  him.  His
fingers tangled in Johnny’s hair and jerked his head down.
Their mouths met, open and hot, and it was impossible to
think, let alone talk, after that.

Hands roamed, pelvises ground together. Brennan

trailed  biting  kisses  down  Johnny’s  chest,  his  hands
seemingly everywhere at once. He disappeared under the
blankets,  and  in  the  next  second  Johnny  felt  his  boxers
being pulled off. Then the tip of his cock was enveloped by
slick,  wet  warmth,  and  he  was  lost,  mind  gone,  his  skin
sensitized and throbbing with the basest type of pleasure.

Long minutes later, after Johnny had come and

then pinned Brennan down to return the favor, rationality
made  a  swift,  unexpected  return  to  Johnny’s  brain.  He
cursed under his breath, remorse rearing up to cast a pall
on  everything  that  had  just  happened.  Anger  at  himself
made  him  lash  out,  and  he  shoved  Brennan  toward  the
edge  of  the  mattress.  “This  can’t  happen  again,
understand?”

Bren glanced over at him and Johnny recognized

the familiar, stubborn tilt to his jaw. “Why not? You liked
it.”

Asylum

“What guy wouldn’t like a blowjob? That doesn’t

change the fact that it shouldn’t. Have. Happened.”

“Are you saying this because of Eddie? It has

nothing to do with him.”

“Jesus Christ. Are you really that oblivious? It has

everything to do with him. Besides, I don’t want this with
you, Bren. I don’t want you.”

Brennan tensed, and for a moment, Johnny

thought he would speak, but all Brennan did was toss the
covers aside and slip quietly out of bed. He bent down to
gather his clothes off the floor and then straightened with
them  in  hand,  casting  Johnny  another  brief  glance.  In  the
semi-darkness,  he  was  beautiful,  his  black  hair  damp  and
curling  around  his  face,  lips  kiss-bruised  and  swollen.
“You’re such a liar, Johnny.”

He left before Johnny could respond, closing the

door  with  a  soft  click  that  somehow  made  Johnny  feel  a
thousand times guiltier than the door-slamming from that
morning. He didn’t want to hurt Brennan’s feelings, hadn’t
enjoyed  the  flash  of  pain  in  Brennan’s  eyes  when  he’d
shoved him away. And he was a liar. But he couldn’t admit
that  to  Brennan.  There  was  no  point.  A  relationship
between  them  could  never  go  anywhere.  Brennan  would
be—should  be—going  places.  Moving  up  in  the  world.
Johnny  had  obligations  to  his  father  and  to  Fear  Asylum.
Not  to  mention  the  Eddie  situation,  and  the  very  real
possibility  of  Johnny  losing  his  best  friend  if  Eddie  ever
found out what had happened between him and Brennan.

Johnny sighed and closed his eyes, bracing his

forearm across his forehead. What a fucking mess. So
much for his attempt at resisting. He’d meant to. But one
kiss, one taste, and his reservations had evaporated faster
than an ice cube in the Mojave. What an absolute fail.

Piper Vaughn

* * *

The following day was a study in evasion for

Johnny. He went out of his way to avoid being alone in the
same room as Brennan. He knew Brennan had noticed, as
well as the ever-perceptive Cameron, but everyone else
seemed oblivious and he was glad for that.

They went about the day and night as counterparts

in  a  careful  dance,  Brennan  stepping  forward  as  Johnny
drew  back,  Brennan  moving  right  as  Johnny  went  left.
Though it seemed like Brennan did his best to try to corner
Johnny, try and talk to him, Johnny managed to dodge and
forestall him until he was back in his room and the house
was dead silent, the other staff-members blissfully asleep,
unaware of the inner turmoil that kept Johnny awake.

Johnny knew Brennan would come, regardless of

what  he’d  said  earlier.  It  was  only  a  matter  of  time.  He’d
prepared  a  speech  in  his  head,  listing  all  of  the  reasons
why  whatever  the  hell  was  happening  between  them
couldn’t possibly continue.

When Brennan snuck into his bed that night,

Johnny  trapped  him  against  the  mattress,  fully  intending
to  deliver  the  speech  he’d  so  carefully  put  together,  but
his  eyes  kept  wandering  to  Brennan’s  lush  mouth,  the
graceful  column  of  his  neck,  the  intriguing  hollow  at  the
base  of  his  throat  that  just  begged  to  be  licked  and
nibbled. Brennan had his eyes lowered at first, deceptively
docile  as  Johnny  held  him  down.  Then,  before  Johnny
could  start  speaking,  Brennan  suddenly  looked  up,  his
golden-brown  eyes  shining  with  amusement,  his  lips
curled  upward  into  a  naughty  little  smile  that  sent  blood
thrumming straight to Johnny’s cock.

“I went to the store today,” Brennan said, his voice

low and breathy. He reached down into the pocket of his

Asylum

robe and slowly withdrew a handful of condoms and a
small tube of lube.

Johnny stared down at the stash of goodies as if he

hadn’t the vaguest idea what they were, the words he’d
memorized dying in his throat.

“I thought we—” But whatever Brennan had

planned to say vanished under the weight of Johnny’s kiss.

It was rash and it was reckless, but Johnny

couldn’t  help  himself.  The  last  two  nights  had  led  to  this
moment.  If  he  were  honest,  there’d  never  really  been  a
chance of his resisting, not after all of the years he’d spent
fantasizing  about  it.  He  kissed  Brennan  as  if  the  act  were
brand new and he was trying to get in as much practice as
possible. Their tongues twined together, luscious and wet.
Brennan’s  fingers  skimmed  up  and  down  his  sides  a  few
times  before  settling  on  his  ass  to  hold  him  in  place  as
Brennan ground up against him.

There were a few times when he could have

stopped,  when  caution  tapped  him  on  the  shoulder  and
said  Hello?  What  the  hell  are  you  doing?,  but  something
drove Johnny on, though whether it was mindless arousal
or  just  sheer  stupidity,  he  couldn’t  say.  Johnny  kissed  his
way  down  Brennan’s  body,  pausing  to  suck  his  cock  and
nuzzle his balls and torment him with slow, drenched licks
around  the  nerve-filled  skin  of  his  puckered  entrance.  He
continued  on,  nibbling  on  long,  lean  thighs  as  Brennan
sighed and moaned his name.

Finally, when Brennan writhed beneath him, his

head thrown back, hands fisted in the sheets, Johnny knelt
upright and slid on a condom. He lubed it up then reached
a  slick  finger  beneath  Brennan’s  sac  to  trace  his  hole.  He
slid  it  carefully  inside  and  paused  to  let  Brennan  adjust.
Brennan  was  tight,  more  so  than  Johnny  had  anticipated
he would be if he’d been having regular sex, and a sudden

Piper Vaughn

thought  occurred  to  him,  one  that  froze  his  blood  and
made  him  feel  like  five  kinds  of  asshole  for  not  asking
about it at the very beginning.

“You’ve never done this before, have you?” he

said, his eyes on Brennan’s face.

Brennan licked his lips nervously and shook his

head. “No.”

Johnny groaned and started to withdraw his finger.

“Brennan—”

“No!” Brennan reached down and grasped his

wrist, stopping his movement. “I want you to be my first.”

“Bren, can’t you see how wrong that would be?”
“Why is it wrong? What difference does it make if

you’re my first or my tenth? Would you rather I picked
some stranger?”

“No, of course not,” Johnny said fiercely. The mere

thought  of  someone  else  touching  Brennan  made  his
stomach  burn  with  an  emotion  he  didn’t  want  to  look  at
too  closely.  “But  you  don’t  understand.  Your  brother
would kill me.”

“Keep my brother out of it.” Brennan stared up at

Johnny, his amber eyes nearly black in the darkness. “This
is about you and me.”

“That’s the point, Brennan. There is no you and me.

This is about fucking. We’re not in a relationship.”

“So fuck me,” Brennan said, rolling his hips to force

Johnny’s finger deeper into his body. “You won’t tell Eddie,
and I sure as hell don’t plan to.”

Johnny groaned again and closed his eyes. The

sensation of Brennan riding his finger made his dick throb
and his groin ache. His balls felt tight and heavy with
arousal.

“More,” Brennan demanded in a shaky voice.

Asylum

And with that one word, Johnny knew he couldn’t

fight it any longer. He withdrew his finger and grabbed the
tube of lube, squeezing a small puddle into the palm of his
hand.  He  dipped  his  index  and  middle  fingers  into  it  and
then  pressed  them  carefully  inside  Brennan,  past  the
resistance  of  that  first  ring  of  muscle,  coating  Brennan’s
smooth inner walls with the slippery substance.

It wasn’t long before Brennan was begging, his

hands  gripping  and  tugging  at  Johnny’s  hips.  Johnny
slicked  the  remainder  of  the  lube  onto  the  condom,
figuring  too  much  was  better  than  too  little,  and
positioned himself at Brennan’s entrance.

Brennan stared up at him with wide, lust-hazed

eyes,  his  straight  white  teeth  digging  into  his  lower  lip.
Johnny watched his face as he pushed inside, searching for
signs  of  discomfort.  There  was  a  moment  when  Brennan
winced, his eyelids squeezing shut. Johnny stilled and gave
him  a  few  seconds  to  recover,  then  pressed  on  when  he
felt Brennan’s muscles relax around him.

Eventually, he was buried to the base of his cock,

his  balls  resting  against  Brennan’s  ass.  Brennan’s  thighs
were braced over his and splayed wide, his hips tilted up at
the  perfect  angle  for  Johnny  to  thrust  in  hard  and  fast.
Johnny  gripped  them  and  poured  himself  into  a  deep,
pounding rhythm.

The first couple of thrusts were slow, and Brennan

took them with a low, breathy moan. But when Johnny let
go,  holding  his  hips  still  to  slam  into  him,  quick  and
intense,  Brennan  gasped  and  grabbed  one  of  the  pillows
next to his head, pulling it over his face so he could scream
into  the  fabric.  It  was  a  good  thing  too,  because  even
muffled  the  scream  was  loud,  echoing  in  the  room  along
with  the  faint  squeak  from  the  box-spring  and  the  sound
of flesh slapping against flesh.

Piper Vaughn

“Do you need me to slow down?” Johnny asked

after Brennan released another noise, something halfway
between a scream and a sob.

“N-no,” Brennan said from beneath the pillow,

punctuating the word with a sharp shake of his head.
“God, please don’t.”

Johnny gave him what he wanted, what they both

wanted.  He  upped  the  pace  until  Brennan  was  babbling
and  incoherent,  saying  things  that  would  probably
embarrass  him  if  he  remembered  them  come  morning.
Brennan’s complete loss of control spurred Johnny on. He
sped  up  until  the  bed  was  almost  vibrating  beneath  their
bodies, then plowed in deep, as deep as he could go, and
held  the  position  as  Brennan  sobbed  and  bucked  against
him, needing movement, searching for friction.

Finally he released Brennan’s hips and bent down

to kiss him. “Touch yourself. I want to see you get off with
my cock inside you.”

Brennan obeyed as Johnny leaned back. His fingers

wrapped around his swollen erection and he moaned from
that very first moment of contact until his body tensed, his
inner  muscles  convulsing  around  Johnny’s  dick,  and  he
came,  shooting  silky  white  ribbons  of  cum  across  the
flawless brown skin of his chest, his body shaking  so hard
that for a second Johnny was worried.

But then Brennan’s eyes opened, the color of fine

whiskey and glazed with passion, and he reached down to
grab  Johnny’s  hand.  He  brought  it  up  to  his  mouth  and
drew  two  fingers  inside,  sucking  and  nibbling  while
keeping his gaze locked on Johnny’s face. Bren rocked his
hips,  encouraging  Johnny  to  move,  and  Johnny gave  in  to
his  urgings,  reestablishing  the  relentless  rhythm  from
before,  plunging  in  and  receding  until  his  own  orgasm
swept up his spine and swirled out into his limbs. His heart

Asylum

beat a frantic tattoo against his rib cage and lights
exploded at the edges of his vision, but he came without
making a single sound, just trembled through it in silence,
his hips juddering reflexively.

He collapsed onto Brennan, still buried inside, and

kissed him, tasting lust and sex and something else that set
off a bittersweet ache in his chest. That night he didn’t kick
Brennan  out,  but  by  the  time  Johnny  woke  up,  he  was
gone.  Johnny  tried  to  ignore  the  pang  of  disappointment
he  felt  when  he  rolled  over  to  find  cool,  rumpled  sheets
instead  of  the  slim,  warm  body  he’d  gotten  to  know  so
well the last few nights.

Johnny showered and pulled on a fresh pair of

jeans  and  a  T-shirt.  He’d  just  finished  running  a  comb
through  his  damp  blond  hair  when  his  cell  phone  buzzed
from  the  bedside  table.  He  rushed  over  to  grab  it  and
cringed when he saw the name flashing across the screen.
Eddie.  It  figured.  What  if  somehow  he  knew  that  Johnny
had  spent  half  the  night  fucking  and  sucking  his  little
brother?  It  was  impossible,  of  course.  How  could  Eddie
possibly  know?  He’d  left  the  crew  two  years  ago  when
he’d met a girl during their stop in Indianapolis and fallen
in love. He was happily married and working a nine-to-five,
with  a  toddler  and  another  baby  on  the  way.  And  he
probably  didn’t  even  miss  the  rootless  lifestyle  he’d  left
behind. His heart had never really been in it anyway.

Johnny hit the answer button and put the phone

up to his ear. “Hey. What’s up?”

“Nothin’ much, bro. I tried calling Bren a few times,

but his phone keeps going to voice mail.”

Johnny swallowed thickly, feeling a stab of guilt in

his gut. “Probably still asleep.”

“Yeah. Well, how are you? How did the opening

go?”

Piper Vaughn

“Awesome. It was our best yet.” Johnny perched

on the edge of his mattress and toed at the pair of dirty
socks on the floor beside the bed. “How are Lilia and
Grace?”

“Great, man,” Eddie replied, and Johnny could hear

the fondness in his tone. “Gracie started walking last
week. Just a few steps at a time, you know, but she’s on
her way.”

“Did you get it on camera?”
Eddie laughed. “Only the very end. I’m going to put

it online for the fam. I’ll send you a link.”

“Cool.”
“So, how has Bren been doing?”
“Fine as far as I can tell.” Johnny coughed lightly

and cleared his throat. “Why do you ask?”

“Well, has he talked to you about anything?”
Johnny felt himself flush, his skin going hot under

the collar of his shirt. He reached up to tug at it, shifting
uncomfortably. “Not really.”

“You okay, bro? You sound kind of… weird.”
“Nah, I’m fine. Just a little tired. What, uh, was

Bren supposed to talk to me about?”

Eddie sighed. “Man, I was worried he hadn’t said

anything yet. I told him not to wait until the last minute.”

“Wait until the last minute for what?”
“Brennan applied at a couple of the colleges here

in  Indy.  He  got  accepted  into  both,  and  I  know  he’d
planned  on  enrolling  in  a  few  classes  for  the  spring
semester  starting  in  January.  My  dad’s  been  on  him  to
stop putting school off, you know? He’s going to come stay
with  me  and  Lil  to  save  on  room  and  board.  As  far  as  I
know,  he  got  approved  for  enough  financial  aid  that  we
won’t owe anything for the semester.”

Asylum

Johnny was stunned into silence. He’d known that

eventually Brennan would move on. It was as inevitable as
summer following spring. Brennan would go, and that was
part of the reason Johnny had fought so hard against their
physical attraction. Johnny just hadn’t expected it to be
this soon, and he hadn’t considered the fact that Brennan
would start making plans without at least informing
Johnny of his intention to leave. Especially now.

After a few moments, he found his voice. “Wow…

no, he hadn’t said anything to me. I didn’t even know he
was thinking about it.”

“Well, you know, that first year when he joined the

Asylum  crew,  it  was  only  supposed  to  be  a  temporary
thing. He didn’t know what he wanted to major in and my
dad  thought  it  might  be  good  for  him  to  get  some  work
experience  and  save  some  money,  but  that  was  almost
two  and  a  half  years  ago.  We’re  worried  if  he  doesn’t  go
now, he never will.”

“Yeah.” Johnny raked the fingers of his free hand

through his hair, mussing the spiky strands. “Yeah, of
course.”

“Look, if he talks to you about it, just try to

convince  him  that  this  is  the  right  thing  to  do.  I  think  he
might  be  having  second  thoughts  about  the  whole  thing,
but this is the best decision for him right now. He doesn’t
have  any  responsibilities  to  anyone,  no  bills  to  worry
about. This is the perfect time for him to go to school.”

“Definitely.”
“Thanks, Johno. And tell him to call me back too.

He never responded to my message from last week.”

“Will do.”
“All right, well, I hear Gracie crying and I’m on

diaper-duty, so…”

Piper Vaughn

Johnny chuckled. “Okay, no problem. Talk to you

later.”

“Later.”
Johnny stared blankly at the phone for a few

minutes  after  Eddie  had  disconnected,  his  thoughts
dwelling on the events of the last few days. Was that why
Brennan had  started  coming  to  him?  Because  he  planned
on leaving and wanted a last-minute fling before he went
off  to  college?  If  that  was  the  case,  Johnny  was  going  to
strangle  that  little  shit.  How  could  he  put  Johnny’s
relationship with Eddie at risk when he knew he wouldn’t
be sticking around anyway? It wasn’t as if Brennan wasn’t
hot  enough  to  have  his  choice  of  guys  once  he  started
school. Why Johnny? Why now?

Granted, Johnny wasn’t exactly blameless in the

situation, but he’d reacted the way almost any guy would
if the person he was secretly attracted to showed up in his
bed one night, naked and yearning. Well, he’d let it go on
for  a  few nights,  and he’d  crossed  a  line  that  could never
be  redrawn,  but  he’d  be  damned  if  he  let  it  continue.  It
was  finished.  Over  and  done  with.  He  just  needed  to  talk
Brennan into staying away from him—and to convince his
body to listen to his brain instead of his dick. Easy as pie.

* * *

When Johnny stepped into the kitchen for

breakfast,  the  first  thing  he  noticed  was  Brennan  sitting
despondently  in  his  chair,  a  plate  of  untouched  food  in
front of him. He was leaning to the left, propped on one of
his  elbows,  his  face  pale  and  withdrawn.  Cameron  was
eyeing Brennan in obvious concern, and he gave Johnny an
inquiring look when he entered the room, to which Johnny
responded with a half-shrug.

Asylum

He settled into his seat and served himself some

scrambled eggs and a few sausage links from the platters
on the table. “This looks great, Cam, thanks.”

Cameron opened his mouth as if he wanted to say

something,  but  then  shut  it  with  a  snap  and  nodded
briefly.  He  stood,  gathered  his  dirty  dishes,  and  turned
toward the sink. While Cam was distracted, Johnny looked
at Brennan, but Bren avoided his gaze.

A moment later, Bren pushed his chair back and

got to his feet. “Thanks, Cam,” he said; then he left the
kitchen, his movements slow and stiff.

“Shit,” Johnny murmured, pushing his eggs around

on  his  plate.  He  knew  what  the  problem  was.  He  hadn’t
exactly  been  gentle  the  night  before.  Brennan  had  been
into  it,  even  begged  him  for  more,  but  he  should  have
known better. Brennan was doubtless feeling every second
of  that  rough  sex,  and  in  places  he  hadn’t  even  known
existed.

“Do you know what’s wrong with him?” Cam asked

without turning around.

Johnny shoved a forkful of eggs into his mouth and

made a noncommittal noise.

“Christ, Johnny, don’t play dumb with me!”
Johnny swallowed hastily, nearly choking at Cam’s

sudden outburst. “Um, sorry, but you’re going to have to
clue me in here. What are you talk—?”

“Cut the shit.” Cameron turned to face him, his

hands dripping sudsy dishwater onto the linoleum floor.
“Dean and I heard you guys. Sound travels through the
vents in this house, and our room is right above yours.”

Johnny dropped his fork onto his plate as his

stomach cramped. “Fuck. Does anyone else know?”

Piper Vaughn

“No, and we don’t plan on telling anyone. But I

thought I should ask if you know what the hell you’re
doing.”

“I’m ending it. Tonight.”
“You’re ending it?” Cam repeated, his eyes wide.

“So, what, you screw him one night and the next day you
tell him it’s over?”

“It should have never started in the first place. He’s

Eddie’s little brother and he’s fucking leaving besides.”

“Leaving?”
“I talked to Eddie this morning. He told me Bren is

moving in with them. He’ll be starting school next spring.”

“Okay,” Cam said slowly. “Let’s just ignore that for

the moment and go back to the matter at hand.”

“I told you I’m going to—”
“End it,” Cameron interrupted with a dismissive

wave. “Yeah, yeah, I know. But my question is: why the
hell did you even start it then?”

“I didn’t start it. He started it. He crawled into my

bed the other night and… fuck, things just happened. I
never meant to let it go as far as it did.”

Cameron shook his head. “Unbelievable. That’s all

you have to say?”

“What do you want me to say?”
“I want you to admit, at least to yourself, that you

let it happen because you’ve wanted Brennan for years.”

“I haven’t—look, I don’t—”
“Johnny, I’ve seen the way you look at him. You

can’t lie to me.”

“Really? Am I that fucking obvious?”
“No. I’ve just known you that long. Eddie probably

would have been able to tell too, but he hasn’t been
around the last couple of years. Lucky for you.”

“Shit.”

Asylum

“If you’re going to end it, really end it, then you’re

going to have to be careful. You’re Mr. Oblivious over
here, so I’m just going to lay out the facts: Brennan is in
love with you.”

A sharp, dark thrill pierced Johnny’s chest at

Cameron’s  words,  catching  him  off  guard.  Hearing
Brennan  and  love  in  the  same  sentence  did  bizarre,
unnerving  things  to  his  body.  He  shook  his  head  and
pushed  the  feelings  aside  with  pitiless  force.  “What?”
Johnny faked a laugh that was nowhere near being honest.
“I  don’t  think  so,  Cam.  I  think  I  would  have  noticed
something like that.”

Cameron just looked at him.
“Are you serious?” Johnny asked, even knowing

Cameron would never joke about such a thing.

“You think I would make something like that up?”

Cameron’s voice was heavy with exasperation. “He’s been
in  love  with  you  since  he  was  a  kid.  The  only  reason  he
wanted to join the Asylum crew was so he could be close
to  you.  He  was  heartbroken  when  you  and  Eddie  left
Miami.  He  couldn’t  wait  until  he  graduated  so  he  could
follow you guys.”

“How exactly do you know all this?”
“I read his mind using my secret telepathic

powers.”  Cameron  snorted.  “How  the  hell  do  you  think?
That  kid  was  terrified  when  he  first  left  his  family  and
joined us, and it’s not like he could talk to Eddie about any
of  it.  So  he  confided  in  me—and  the  only  reason  I’m
betraying his trust right now is because I don’t want you to
fuck  it  up.  If  you’re  going  to  break  things  off,  be  gentle
about  it,  okay?  That’s  the  only  advice  I’m  going  to  give
you.”

Having said his piece, Cameron turned back to the

sink. Johnny stared at his back, his brows drawn together

Piper Vaughn

in  bewilderment.  Brennan  loved  him.  So  what  was  he
supposed  to  do  about  it?  How  could  he  say  what  he
needed  to  say  to  Brennan  with  that  knowledge  in  his
head? And why did that information fill him with as much
delight as dismay?

He thought maybe he should ask Cameron for help,

since right then it seemed that Cam knew Brennan better
than  he  did,  despite  the  disparity  in  how  long  they’d
known  each  other.  But the  moment he  decided to  speak,
Dean came ambling into the kitchen followed by a couple
of  the other  crew  members  who  were  sharing  the  house.
Johnny  forced down  a  few  bites  of  food  and  dumped  the
remainder  in  the  trash,  then  added  his  plate  to  the  dirty
pile of dishes beside the sink.

Cameron gave him a pointed look but said nothing.

The opportunity to talk in private had passed, and Johnny
had a sudden, overwhelming urge to get out of the house.
It’d been years since he’d visited Chicago and he had
several hours to kill. Maybe a drive and the crisp fall air
would help to clear his head. He could only hope.

Chapter Two

The third night at Fear Asylum went much the

same  as  the  first  two.  Johnny  got  a  few  particularly  good
scares at the very beginning and ended his shift on a high
note  after  having  terrified  two  girls  so  much  they  burst
into hysterical tears and had to be escorted outside using
one  of  the  emergency  passageways  they  had  set  up  for
such instances. He probably should have felt bad about it,
but  in reality,  he  wanted  to  pat himself  on  the back  for a
job well done. It was, after all, what his guests paid for.

After they’d closed down and done all their final

checks,  they  walked  a  few  blocks  down  to  where  they’d
parked their cars. Brennan came to Johnny’s Challenger, as
usual,  but  slid  into  the  back  beside  Cameron,  leaving  the
passenger seat to Dean. If Dean found it odd, he didn’t say
so,  just  settled  amiably  in  the  leather  seat  and  leaned
forward to fiddle with the radio controls.

They made the drive back to the rental house

without speaking, the silence broken only by the low pulse
of  music  coming  from  the  speakers.  Everyone  seemed
tired  and  a  bit  subdued.  When  they  got  to  the  house,
Cameron  headed  straight  to  the  kitchen  to  put  together
some  snacks  for  the  other  crew  members.  Once  again,
Johnny  skipped  the  food  and  chatter  in  favor  of  a  quick
shower  before  bed.  He  stuck  a  South  Park  DVD  into  the
player  and  was  just  drifting  off  to  the  sound  of  Cartman

Piper Vaughn

and Kyle arguing when the door to the bathroom swung
open and Brennan paused in the threshold.

Johnny watched him cross the room in surprise.

Based  on  the  way  Brennan  had  acted  all  day,  Johnny  had
assumed  he  would  stay  away,  at  least  for  a  while.
Apparently not.

When Brennan reached the bed, he hesitated,

looking uncertain. Johnny wasn’t sure what prompted him
to  do  it,  but  before  he  could  reconsider,  he  lifted  the
covers  in  silent  invitation.  Brennan  slipped  beneath  them
and nestled close, his head resting in the crook of Johnny’s
arm.

Johnny ran a hand along Brennan’s side to his hip,

eyeing  him  in  contemplation.  “You  must  be  a  glutton  for
punishment,”  he  murmured,  watching  Brennan’s  face  as
he  skimmed  a  finger  between  his  cheeks  and  pressed
lightly against his opening.

Brennan tried to hide his wince at the touch, but

the tremor in his limbs gave him away. “I thought maybe
we could just… you know, like before?”

Johnny reached up to grip his hair, tilting Brennan’s

head so he could speak directly into his ear. He pitched his
voice low with just the slightest hint of menace. “Yeah? Is
that what you thought? What if that’s not what I want?”

Brennan shuddered, tipping his head back further

as Johnny leaned down to suck at the pulse that fluttered
frantically at the base of his throat. “Fine. I’ll do anything
you want.”

Though his cock grew instantly hard at the words,

Johnny shook his head. “No. Don’t be stupid. I’d never hurt
you like that.” He trailed his fingers down Brennan’s chest
toward the erection he could feel straining against his
abdomen. “What do you want, Bren? Tell me.”

Asylum

“I want you. I want your hands on me, your mouth

on me.”

Johnny fisted Brennan’s length, circling his thumb

around the sensitive head. “Here?”

Brennan trembled, his back arching. “Yeah,” he

whispered. “Please.”

And like that, Johnny’s thoughts of ending it were

forgotten.

* * *

They didn’t speak the next night, just came

together  in  silence,  movements  slow  and  sensuous  in the
dark. On the seventh night, Brennan said he was ready to
have  Johnny  inside  of  him  again  and  any  further
conversation was lost amidst their wild, heated kisses. The
tenth  night,  Johnny  finally  built  up  the  courage  to  tell
Brennan  it  would  be  the  last.  And  then  again  on  the
eleventh,  twelfth,  and  thirteenth.  The  night  after  that,
Johnny  insisted  it  would  really,  honestly,  be  the  very  last
time.

“Mmm-hmm,” Brennan murmured and then

leaned down to take Johnny’s cock into his mouth and
suck him off.

By the fifteenth night, Johnny started to feel a little

irritated.  Sure,  the  sex  was  great.  Amazing,  in  fact.  But
Brennan’s visits were seriously cutting into his sleep time,
and  a  sleep-deprived  Johnny  was  never  a  good  thing.  So,
as Brennan climbed into bed and went to kiss him, Johnny
braced a hand against his shoulder and held him back. He
told  Brennan  in  no  uncertain  terms  that  it  would  be  the
last  time.  The  official,  100  percent  guaranteed,  final  time
they would ever be together in that way.

Piper Vaughn

“Okay,” Brennan said, and when it was over, he left

without having to be told.

The following night, Johnny lay awake as the

minutes stretched into hours, expecting Brennan to come
despite  his  words  from  the  day  before.  It  was  the  first
night  he’d  spent  in  complete  solitude  in  over  two  weeks,
but he woke up even more tired than before. At breakfast,
he  barely  managed  to  stop  himself  from  glaring  at
Brennan,  who  looked  disgustingly  cheerful  and  refreshed,
his black hair hanging to his chin in loose waves, still damp
from his morning shower.

And so it continued for days. Johnny tossed and

turned  in  bed,  restless  and  unable  to  sleep,  annoyed  by
the  faint  traces  of  coconut  that  clung  to  his  pillowcases
from  Brennan’s  shampoo.  The  following  morning  he
stripped  the  sheets  and  washed  them,  but  as  he  went  to
bed  that  night,  nostrils  filled  with  the  clean  scent  of
laundry  detergent  instead  of  Brennan,  he  regretted  it,
especially  when  the  darkness  leached  away  into  the
orange glow of dawn and Brennan still hadn’t come.

By the twentieth night, Johnny had given up on

sleep  altogether.  Ignoring  the  bed,  he  settled  at  his  desk
and  booted  up  his  laptop  so  he  could  waste  a  few  hours
online.  He  checked  his  messages,  updated  Fear  Asylum’s
Web  site,  and  watched  the  video  of  Eddie’s  daughter,
Gracie,  taking  her  first  steps.  Johnny  wondered  briefly  if
Brennan  had  seen  it,  then  cussed  himself  out  for  even
thinking  the  kid’s  name.  He’d  gotten  what  he’d  wanted,
hadn’t he? Things were finished with Brennan, and it was
for  the  best  considering  the  fact  that  Brennan  probably
intended on leaving after the Halloween season was over.

Finally, bored with surfing the Internet, Johnny

shut down the laptop and went upstairs for a snack. He
grabbed a can of Coke and a bag of chips and headed back

Asylum

down to the basement. Just when he’d reached the
bottom step, Brennan’s door clicked open and startled
amber eyes met his.

Johnny forced himself to look away and cross to his

own  door,  but  once  he  was  there,  he  couldn’t  bring
himself  to  push  it  open.  He  glanced  sideways  to  see  that
Brennan  stood  frozen  in  place,  watching  him.  Their  eyes
met once again, the air between them practically crackling
with  tension.  Then  Brennan  started  to  close  the  gap
between them, his steps hesitant at first but increasing in
speed until he’d reached Johnny’s side. Johnny transferred
the  chips  and  Coke  into  one  hand  and  reached  down  to
twist the knob and shove the door open.

Brennan stepped past him into the room and

Johnny  entered  after him,  nudging  the door  shut  with his
foot. In the next second, the bag of chips hit the floor and
the can flew from his grasp as Brennan slammed him back
against  the  door  and  mashed  their  lips  together.  Johnny
reached down to grip Brennan’s ass, moaning at the taste
of  him,  pulling  him  close,  closer,  desperate  for  contact
after so many days without.

Brennan made a soft sound into his mouth. At first

Johnny paid it no attention, knowing that a groan had
rumbled from his own chest when their lips had touched,
but then he felt something warm and wet against his skin,
and finally he recognized what it was. He pulled back,
shocked to see that Brennan was crying. “What—?”

“Say it.” Brennan choked over the words. “Tell me

you don’t want this. Tell me it can’t happen again.”

“Don’t.” Johnny swiped at the tears on Brennan’s

cheeks with the pads of his thumbs. “You’re being
ridiculous.”

“Say it.”

Piper Vaughn

“Stop.” Johnny brushed his lips across Brennan’s

mouth, his chest tight. “Bren,” he whispered, his hands
slipping under the hem of Brennan’s shirt to run across the
smooth skin of his back. “Don’t cry.”

Johnny kissed him again, nipping at his full lower

lip,  his  fingers  dipping  past  the  waistband  of  Brennan’s
sweatpants  to  cup  his  cheeks  and  bring  their  pelvises
together. They made their way toward the bed, stumbling
and  tripping  as  they  tried  to  strip  without  breaking  their
desperate kiss. Somehow they wound up on their knees on
the  floor  instead  with  Brennan’s  arms  braced  on  the
mattress,  his  head  hanging  down,  hair  falling  forward  to
shield  his  face.  He  was  shaking,  fine  tremors  running
through  his  body  as  he  begged  Johnny  to  touch  him,
everywhere, anywhere, just please, please, right now.

Johnny pressed a kiss to Brennan’s nape and

stroked a comforting hand along the length of his spine. “I
know,  baby.  Right  now.  Need  to  be  in  you.”  He  grabbed
the  lube  and  a  condom  from  the  nightstand  and  rolled  it
on, then slicked himself up and reached down to rub some
over Brennan’s entrance. Without any further preparation,
he  lined  himself  up  and  pressed  inside,  slow  and  steady,
until  Brennan’s  body  had  swallowed  his  length  and  his
chest was flush with Brennan’s back.

He curled an arm around Brennan’s abdomen to

hold  him  in  place  and  began  to  thrust.  As  he  moved,  he
dropped  light,  nibbling  kisses  along  the  side  of  Brennan’s
throat, captivated by the feel of that satin skin, the sweet
smell  of  Brennan’s  hair,  the  soft,  needy  noises  Brennan
couldn’t seem to contain.

Brennan turned his head and their mouths met

again. He tasted of salt, and Johnny wondered if he was
still crying, but then Brennan’s tongue flicked past his lips
and his hips shoved down into Johnny’s upward thrusts,

Asylum

and all thoughts of tears and excuses and reasons for why
they shouldn’t be together disappeared into the visceral
lust that pulsed between them.

Johnny broke the kiss and pushed Brennan forward

until  his  face  rested  against  the  edge  of  the  mattress.  He
leaned  back  on  his  arms,  bracing  his  hands  on  the  floor,
and  pounded  up  into  Brennan,  fascinated  by  the  sight  of
his  cock  as  it  moved  in  and  out  of  Brennan’s  stretched
opening.  Brennan  moaned  brokenly  and  spread  his  knees
farther  apart,  allowing  Johnny  to  push  in  deeper.  His
movements  picked  up  speed  and  he  banged  up  into
Brennan,  carnal  and  rough.  Their  bodies  surged  together,
straining with frantic hunger, skin sweat-slick and hot.

Brennan’s inner muscles spasmed around him.

Johnny  saw  one  of  Brennan’s  arms  drop  down,  his  hand
slipping  between  his  legs  to  stroke  himself  in  time  with
Johnny’s thrusts. Seconds later, Brennan’s back went rigid
as he came and his body clamped down on Johnny’s cock,
the  constricting  pressure  enough  to  trigger  Johnny’s  own
orgasm. His head fell back; his arms trembled. He cried out
Brennan’s name, loud enough that he knew Cameron and
Dean  had  probably  heard  him.  As  if  they’d  somehow
missed  all  of  the  other  noise  he  and  Bren  had  been
making.  Neither  of them  had  even  attempted  to  be quiet
as they had before.

Brennan slumped against the side of the bed, his

limbs quivering from the occasional aftershock. When
Johnny had caught his breath, he withdrew and leaned up
to press another kiss to Brennan’s nape. “Come on. Let’s
take a shower.”

He got to his feet and helped Brennan stand, but

instead of moving toward the bathroom, Brennan looped
his arms around Johnny’s waist and clung to him, nuzzling

Piper Vaughn

his face into the curve where Johnny’s neck met his
shoulder. “I missed you, Johnny. Did you miss me?”

“Not at all,” Johnny said, but he wrapped his arms

around Brennan and pulled him closer.

“Liar.”

* * *

The nightly visits resumed after that. They had sex

in every position Johnny could think of and some he’d
never even considered before. They never talked about it,
but Brennan always left afterward. There were a few times
he hesitated and Johnny thought he might ask to stay, but
then Brennan would shake his head and give Johnny a sad
little smile, tinged with regret, and he would leave without
a word.

Days passed and Halloween drew closer, a sinister

presence on the horizon. Johnny attempted to broach the
subject  of  school  to  Brennan  more  than  once,  but
something kept holding him back. Fear of what the answer
might  be,  he  guessed,  after  the  second  failed  attempt,
when  some  unnamable  force  stopped  the  words  in  his
throat. He wasn’t sure how he’d react to the confirmation
that  Brennan  really  was  leaving.  He’d  gotten  too
accustomed  to  having  Bren  around,  to  seeing  his  face
every morning, and lately, to being in his body every night.
Johnny  didn’t  know  how  he  would  give  that  up,  give  him
up. But he had to.

On the morning of the twenty-fourth, one week

exactly  from  the  day  Johnny  was  dreading,  the  day  when
he’d  have  no  choice  but  to  ask  whether  or  not  Brennan
planned to continue on to Texas with the others or take a
bus to Indianapolis to join his brother, Cameron reminded
everyone  about  the  upcoming  “Asylum  Crew  Fieldtrip.”

Asylum

Earlier in the month they’d made plans to visit the Shedd
Aquarium  and  The  Art  Institute  before  hitting  downtown
Chicago  for  an  early  dinner  and  some  hardcore shopping.
Johnny  had  completely  forgotten  about  it,  and  as  night
approached,  he  found  himself  trying  to  come  up  with  an
excuse to get out of going. He mentioned it to Brennan as
they  lay  in  a  drowsy,  satiated  heap,  their  arms  and  legs
tangled.

“Hmm.” Brennan gave one of Johnny’s nipples a

playful lick. “Pretend you’re sick, and I’ll stay behind to
take care of you.”

So Johnny did. Not that Cameron believed him, or

anyone else for that matter. But Cam didn’t call him on it,
just rolled his eyes and shook his head and ushered the
rest of the crew members out of the house.

“Clean up your messes,” he said, giving them a

meaningful look over his shoulder as he walked out the
door.

The moment it closed behind him, Brennan

pounced. He hit Johnny at a dead run, flinging his arms
around Johnny’s neck and hoisting himself up so he could
link his ankles behind Johnny’s back. Johnny staggered and
probably would have fallen had the momentum not driven
him back against the wall. His hands automatically went to
Brennan’s denim-clad ass to support his weight. “Jesus,
Bren, are you trying to kill me?”

Brennan nipped at Johnny’s earlobe. “No. But I do

want to fuck you. Right here or maybe over the arm of the
couch.”

Johnny was hard before Brennan finished the

sentence. “Yeah?” he said, gripping Brennan’s ass a little
tighter, his voice breathless.

“Hell yeah.”

Chapter Three

“I like this city.”
Johnny glanced over at Brennan with a smile. “I do

too.”

They were cruising down Lakeshore Drive, people-

watching and admiring the view of Lake Michigan as they
headed  back  to  the  north  side.  They’d  left  the  house
intending  to  grab  some  lunch—after  cleaning  up  their
mess, of course—but what had started as a quick trip had
turned into a mini-sightseeing expedition.

Johnny didn’t mind. It was the first time he and

Brennan had spent any real time alone together outside of
his bedroom. When traveling with the same small group of
people, there was almost always someone else around. He
was glad they’d decided to skip out on the plans with the
other crew members. Maybe he was being greedy, but he
wanted Bren to himself. If all he had left were a few days,
he didn’t want to have to share.

While his mind was on the subject, he knew he

should say something. There probably wouldn’t be a
better opportunity. But he couldn’t get the words past the
lump in his throat. Just one more day. One more day like
this and then we’ll talk.

“You know,” Brennan said as Johnny turned off

Lakeshore Drive, “there’s something I’ve been wanting to
try…”

Piper Vaughn

“Hmm?” Johnny murmured distractedly, his eyes

on a couple of girls who were standing on the edge of the
curb while they waited to cross the street. He’d thought
for a second that they were just going to dart into traffic
without waiting for the light to change, but—

“Road head.”
Johnny’s hands jerked on the wheel and his tires

swerved  over  the  middle  line.  He  righted  the  car  under  a
barrage of honking horns, lifting his hand in apology to the
guy  he’d  nearly  sideswiped.  Only  once  he’d  driven  a  few
blocks and made a right onto one of the side streets that
led  to  the  rental  house  did  he  risk  a  quick  look  in
Brennan’s direction.

“As you can see, there are some safety risks

involved with that idea,” he muttered.

Brennan laughed. “We should be okay, I think, if

you stick to the residential areas.”

“It’s not a good idea, Bren.”
“Well…” Brennan shrugged. “If you don’t think you

can handle it…”

“Who said I couldn’t handle it?”
Bren appeared to think it over for a second. “I

believe you just did.”

“I can handle it.”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“I know what you’re trying to do, you little brat. It

won’t work.”

“It’s okay, Johnny. I understand if you’re scared.”
“Oh, fuck you.” Johnny reached over and grabbed

Brennan’s nape, squeezing lightly. “C’mere then.”

Brennan grinned at him as he unbuckled his

seatbelt. “Just tell me if it gets to be too much for you, old
man.”

“I’m going to pay you back for that later.”

Asylum

Brennan didn’t reply. He was too busy unzipping

Johnny’s pants, his tongue poking out from between his
lips as he worked. Once he had Johnny’s cock free, he
didn’t waste any time. He ducked down and took as much
as he could into his mouth, using his fist to stroke the rest.

Johnny tightened his hands on the wheel and tried

to concentrate. It was difficult with Brennan’s mouth on
him, surrounding him with tight, wet heat. Brennan wasn’t
taking it easy on him either. His fingers massaged Johnny’s
balls through his boxers and he sucked like he was starved
for the taste, as if they hadn’t just gone down on each
other that very morning.

The area they were staying in had lots of trees, and

it  being  the  middle  of  the  day,  the  street  parking  was
mostly empty… which Johnny discovered was a good thing
when  Brennan  took  him  deep  and  he  felt  the  tip  of  his
cock hit the back of Brennan’s throat. He veered into one
of the  open  spots  beside  a  large  oak  and  put  the  car  into
park. His fingers twisted into Brennan’s dark waves and he
thrust up a few times before he came in a warm rush, his
hands  holding  Brennan’s  head  down,  knowing  he  could
take  it.  When  he  was  spent,  Johnny  released  him,  and
Brennan sat up slowly. He licked his lips and gave Johnny a
cocky smirk, assured that he’d won the round.

Johnny didn’t think about where they were and

who might see. He grabbed Brennan and kissed the smirk
right  off  his  mouth.  Brennan  moaned  into  the  kiss,  his
hands  coming  up  to  grip  Johnny’s  shoulders  as  Johnny
reached  between  their  bodies  and  fondled  his  erection
through  the  material  of  his  jeans.  He  undid  Brennan’s  fly
with  nimble  fingers  and  slipped  them  past  the  waistband
of  Brennan’s  boxer-briefs.  Fisting  Brennan’s  shaft,  Johnny
started  a  quick,  rough  stroke  that  soon  had  Brennan
shuddering  against  him.  Within  seconds,  the  kiss  went

Piper Vaughn

from intense to frantic. They devoured each other,
tongues twining, teeth nipping.

By the time Johnny pulled away to bury his face

against Brennan’s throat, his lips stung and his cock was
half-hard again. He bit Brennan’s neck and tugged at his
dick. “Come on,” he growled, his voice so thick with lust he
barely recognized it. “Come for me. I wanna feel it.”

Whether it was in response to the command or just

Johnny’s  hand  on  his  cock,  Brennan  let  his  head  fall  back
and  came  almost  instantly,  gushing  hot  and  slippery  over
Johnny’s  fingers.  And,  fuck,  it  was  beautiful.  The  graceful
column of his  throat  was  completely  exposed  and  Johnny
couldn’t  resist  running  his  tongue  along  the  length  of  his
jugular,  across  his  jaw,  and  up  to  his  earlobe,  where  he
paused  to  suck  and  nibble.  Brennan  quaked  against  him
and made a sound that took Johnny’s cock from lying half-
hard against his thigh to standing at full attention.

Johnny released him and collapsed into his seat,

wrapping  the  hand  he’d  used  to  get  Brennan  off  around
his own dick. He gave it a few leisurely pulls, the slickness
of Brennan’s cum acting as lubrication, and added his own
to  the  mix  a  couple of moments  later, his  second  orgasm
stretching longer than the first, diffusing through his limbs
like slow-flowing honey.

He was panting when it was over, his body strung

taut,  but  gradually  he  became  aware  of  his  surroundings
again.  The  realization  of  what  had  just  happened,  out  in
public  and  in  broad  daylight  no  less,  had  him  bolting
upright  and  peering  around  in  horror.  He  couldn’t  see
anyone around, but he was too alarmed to feel any kind of
relief.  How  could  he  have  let  things  get  so  out  of  hand?
What  the  hell  was  wrong  with  him?  What  if  there  had
been  kids  playing  nearby?  Or,  worse  yet,  a  cop  driving
past? God, what a shitstorm that would have been.

Asylum

Johnny glanced sideways at Brennan. He was

slumped  against  the  door,  eyes  closed  and  a  blissful
expression  on  his  face. His  pants  were  still  open  and  cum
stained his underwear and the bottom of his shirt. Seeing
it reminded Johnny that he still hadn’t cleaned himself up.
He  leaned  over  and  opened  the  glove  compartment,
snagging a couple of napkins from the stash he kept inside.
He  used  them  to  wipe  himself  off  as  best  he  could  and
tossed them onto the floorboard. After redoing his pants,
he  put  the  car  into  drive  and  pulled  out  onto  the  street
without saying a word.

Brennan straightened when the car started

moving.  He  tucked  himself  back  into  his  jeans  and  pulled
up  his  zipper.  “Holy  shit,  that  was  amazing,”  he  said,
reaching  over  to  grab  Johnny’s  hand  and  thread  their
fingers together. “I can’t believe you came twice in a row.
You were so fucking hot.”

Johnny yanked his hand away and placed it on the

steering wheel, gripping it with white-knuckled tension.

“What is it?” Brennan asked, not quite able to hide

the hurt in his tone. “What’s wrong?”

Johnny shook his head. This thing between them, it

was  too  dangerous.  Johnny  had  never  been  so  desperate
for  someone  that  he’d  literally  forgotten  where  he  was.
Until Brennan. He didn’t like feeling so out of control, as if
his  body  was  acting  of  its  own  free  will,  against  his
reservations  and  better  judgment.  So  many  things  could
have  gone  wrong,  but  his  desire  for  Brennan  made  him
reckless.

“Johnny?”
“We can’t do this anymore.”
“What?”
“I mean it, Bren. We just can’t.”
“I don’t understand.”

Piper Vaughn

They reached the rental house then. Johnny parked

the Challenger and cut the engine, but he didn’t make any
move to get out of the car. Neither did Brennan.

Johnny took a deep breath and turned to face him.

Brennan’s  eyes  were  wide  and  his  mouth  trembled.  He
was  obviously  fighting  to  keep  his  emotions  in  check  and
probably  only  seconds  away  from  failing.  Johnny  wished
he  could  spare  Brennan  any  additional  pain,  but  there
were no other options. He’d do what needed to be done.

“This was a mistake. This and everything else that’s

happened between us.”

Brennan flinched away from his words. “Why are

you saying this? Where is this coming from all of a
sudden?”

“You can’t be that surprised, Brennan. I told you

from the very beginning that we aren’t in a relationship.
This is, and has always been, about fucking.”

“But I thought that when… I thought you’d changed

your mind… after that night.”

That night. When days of yearning had culminated

in Johnny taking him on the floor with rough urgency and
then later allowing Brennan to top him for the first time,
face-to-face, slow and gentle and sweet.

But none of that mattered. Brennan was leaving,

moving  on  to  greener  pastures  and  greater  things.  If  he
thought he had something with Johnny, something lasting,
he  might  want  to  stay.  And  later  he  might  regret  having
chosen  Johnny  and  his nomadic  existence over moving  to
Indianapolis  and  being  near  his  family,  going  to  college,
meeting someone who could love him the way he wanted.
What  if  Brennan  picked  Johnny  and  then  one  day  he
looked back and resented his decision? Maybe Johnny was
getting  ahead  of  himself  by  contemplating  those  things,

Asylum

but what was the point in risking it? Their relationship, or
lack thereof, could only end one way: badly.

“Nothing’s changed,” Johnny said finally. “I know

what you want and I can’t give it to you.”

“I just want to be with you. I won’t ask for anything

more.”

Johnny sighed. “Don’t sell yourself short, kid.”
“I’m not a kid.”
“You know what I mean. You can do better than

this. Better than me.”

“Shouldn’t I be the judge of that?” Brennan’s voice

broke on the last word, and he looked away, glancing out
the front windshield, his jaw working.

“Don’t make this harder than it needs to be. I know

you’re going to be leaving. There’s no point in dragging
this out any further.”

Brennan’s head jerked toward him in surprise.

“How did you—?”

“Your brother told me. When were you going to?”
Brennan frowned, shrugging lightly. “I hadn’t

decided for sure yet.”

“What’s there to decide?” Johnny asked, searching

Brennan’s face. “You can’t really want to stay with the
Asylum crew forever.”

“You have no idea what I want.” Brennan glared at

Johnny, his amber eyes fierce. “And you know, that really
amazes me because I thought I’d made it pretty obvious.”

“Bren—”
“No. We’re done here, aren’t we? You decided

that.” He turned and pushed the car door open before
Johnny could stop him.

Johnny watched him run up the stairs and go into

the house. He groaned, slamming his palms against the
steering wheel. Fuck. That hadn’t gone as he’d intended.

Chapter Four

The next several days passed with torturous

slowness. Johnny hadn’t spoken to Brennan since their last
conversation  in  his  car.  No  one  in  the  house  had  seemed
to  notice  the  sudden  tension  between  them  except  for
Cameron,  though  he  never  brought  it  up,  at  least  not  to
Johnny. He knew Cam had talked to Brennan, though. But
when  he’d  asked  if  Brennan  was  okay,  Cameron  had  just
given  him  a  long,  hard  look,  his  lips  flattened  into  a  thin
line of displeasure, and shaken his head.

Johnny had been tempted to go to Brennan more

than  once,  late  at night when the  air  in  his  room  seemed
to crush down on him, still and oppressive, heavy with so
many  unvoiced  regrets.  He  couldn’t  stand  the  idea  of
Brennan  leaving,  going  out  into  the  world  hating  him,
being  angry  with  him,  hurting  because  of  him.  But  fear
held  him  back.  As  usual.  Fear  that  if  he  was  alone  with
Brennan,  if  Brennan  reached  for  him,  touched  him,  all  of
his doubts and good intentions would crumble into dust.

As Halloween drew nearer, Fear Asylum got busier

and the nights got harder. He woke on the morning of the
twenty-eighth with a persistent throbbing in his temples.
He’d lain in bed awake until after dawn, the urge to go to
Brennan so strong it was as if his body literally ached to
cross the twelve feet that separated their rooms and take
Brennan into his arms. When he’d looked at himself in the

Piper Vaughn

bathroom mirror, he’d been surprised to see how haggard
he looked, his skin sallow instead of its normal light gold,
his green eyes dull from lack of sleep.

Of course, that night would be Fear Asylum’s

craziest  so far.  The  line stretched  even  longer than  it  had
during  the  grand  opening.  It  was  the  start  of  Halloween
weekend,  so  it  wasn’t  entirely  unexpected,  but  the
customers  were  starting  to  get  antsy  from  having  to  wait
for  so  long.  To  top  that  off,  the  light  drizzle  that  had
started  an  hour  before  had  progressed  into  a  full-out
thunderstorm.  Most  of  the  line  was  uncovered  and  it’d
thinned out considerably once the rain had started, but a
surprising number of customers stayed.

They were about an hour from closing time when

the storm took a turn for the worse. Johnny was in a group
with a couple of guys and five or six women. He’d been up
to  his  usual  tricks,  setting  off  a  variety  of  hidden  booby
traps designed for optimal scares depending on what area
of  the  haunted  house  his  group  wandered  into,  when  a
sudden  boom  of  thunder  sounded.  It  was  loud  enough
that the entire building seemed to shake for a second and
then  the  lights  flickered  and  abruptly  went  out.  Several
people screamed.

Johnny waited for the emergency lights to kick on…

and waited. After a few moments, it became apparent that
they  weren’t  going  to.  Then  the  panic  really  set  in.  There
were  more  screams.  Someone  shoved  him  and  he
stumbled back, reaching blindly behind him to try to find a
wall.  A  second  push  came  from  the  opposite  direction  as
someone  rushed  by  him,  trampling  on  his  foot  in  the
process.

Finally, Johnny located a wall and pressed himself

flat against it. The atmosphere in the warehouse had gone
from panic to sheer hysteria. People were yelling,

Asylum

screaming,  crying,  and  he  didn’t  have  a  goddamn  clue
what to do about it. Of course, this would happen one of
the  rare  times  he  forgot  the  miniature  flashlight  he
normally  stuffed  into  his  back  pocket  at  the  beginning  of
his shift. They had emergency flashlights stored in various
locations  around  the  building  too,  but  it  was  so  black  he
couldn’t  even  see  the  hand  he’d  lifted  to  his  face.  The
darkness was impenetrable, thick with tension, and stifling
to  the  point  that  he  felt  suffocated.  He  couldn’t  see  to
walk,  let  alone  find  a  flashlight.  Not  to  mention  the  fact
that the room around him was in chaos.

Another scream ripped through the air, one that

sent a chill down Johnny’s spine and made him straighten
from  his  position  against  the  wall  because  it  was  edged
with pain as well as fear. People were getting hurt and he
had  to  do  something  about  it.  Fear  Asylum  and  everyone
inside,  guests  and  staff  alike,  were  his  responsibility.  His
father  had  left  him  in  charge  for  the  Halloween  season
while  he  took  some  time  off  from  the  constant  touring,
and Johnny was failing in his duty by cowering against the
wall like a chickenshit. He remembered that, power outage
or not, he had a fully functioning cell phone in his pocket,
and  in  the  very  least  he  should  call  the  police  and  then
start trying to contact his staff.

“Everyone, please stay calm!” he shouted into the

darkness, though he doubted anyone heard him over the
general ruckus. “I’m going to call the police. Please just try
to stay where you are. If you have a cell phone, you can—”

A cacophony of voices interrupted him.
“Get us the fuck out of here!”
“Why aren’t the emergency lights on?”
“Don’t you guys have a backup generator?”
“Please, everyone—” he started, only to be cut off

again. Johnny sighed and ignored the yelling. He didn’t

Piper Vaughn

have any answers and he was wasting time trying to talk
over people who weren’t willing to listen. He dialed 911 on
his phone and put it up to his ear. Thankfully, the call went
through to an operator almost immediately and he
reported the incident as quickly as he could, struggling to
be heard over the continual commotion.

“Sir, we’re sending several officers to the area right

now. There’ve been reports of power lines on fire and a
transformer in the area being struck by lightning.”

“But what am I supposed to do until then? Are they

going to reroute the electricity or something?”

“Sir, I can’t answer as to when electricity might be

restored. Please try to keep your customers calm and if
possible, start them in an orderly progression to exit the
building.”

“But it’s fucking pitch black in here!”
“Please refrain from using such language with me,

sir. I’m aware of your situation. If you can’t exit, stay in
place until the police arrive.”

“I’m sorry, ma’am, but people are going crazy in

here and I think a few of them are hurt—”

“Emergency services are on their way.”
Johnny just barely prevented himself from

snapping  again.  He  took  a  deep  breath  in  and  let  it  out
through  his  nostrils,  then  thanked  the  operator  and
disconnected the call. There was nothing she could do, he
knew that, but he hated feeling so powerless.

There was another scream and a groan from

nearby. Johnny pressed one of the buttons on his phone to
light up the screen and aimed it away from him into the
darkness. A flashlight app would have sure come in handy
right then, but he’d never wanted to splurge for a pricey,
high-tech phone when his contract came up for renewal.
This was what he got for being cheap. He could see a few

Asylum

points of light in the crowd, though. There were bound to
be  plenty  of  customers  with  fancier  phones  than  his.  He
wasn’t sure how much range they would get in this crowd,
but  any  light  was  better  than  total  darkness.  “People,
please try to stay where you—”

“Johnny?” The beam from a flashlight swung over

him and returned. “Thank God. Here, take this.”

Suddenly, Cameron was there, pressing one of the

high-intensity emergency Maglites into Johnny’s palm. He
looked  frazzled,  his  normally  immaculate  brown  hair
mussed, his lower lip stained with blood. “We have to start
leading  people  out,”  Cam  said  as  Johnny  switched  on  his
flashlight.  “Everyone  else  has  a  flashlight  already  and
we’ve cleared out most of the lower level, but I can’t find
Brennan.”

Brennan. Johnny’s body went cold. “Where was

he? Was he in a group?”

“Yeah, I think so. I’ve been looking all over, but it’s

a madhouse in here.”

As Cameron spoke, several other crew members

appeared behind him with additional flashlights. They
glanced at the crowd that had formed around Johnny and
Cameron as they talked.

“Is everyone okay?” Johnny recognized Dean’s

voice. “We’re going to start leading you guys out single
file. Please follow Matt to the stairwell on the right. If you
need help, stay behind and one of us will assist you.”

Johnny grabbed Cameron’s arm. “I’m going to go

look for Brennan, okay? Do you guys have this?”

“Yeah, just go. Call me when you find him.”
Johnny nodded and took off toward the stairs on

the  other  side  of  the  room,  ducking  around  props  and
animated  zombies  and  werewolves  that  had  frozen  in
place  when  the  power  went  off.  The  beam  from  his

Piper Vaughn

flashlight bounced off snarling faces, decapitated  corpses,
and other gory, nightmarish creatures, all of them familiar
but frightening  for  the  very  first  time because  of  the  fear
and  adrenaline  running  through  his  bloodstream.  He  was
terrified  for  Brennan.  What  if  he  was  hurt  and  lying  in
some  corner  of  the  warehouse  in  the  dark,  alone  and
afraid? What if he’d tripped and fallen down the stairs and
broken his neck?

A multitude of scenarios flashed through Johnny’s

mind  as  he  searched,  each  progressively  worse  than  the
last. His search of the third floor turned up nothing in the
main  areas,  so  he  went  to  look  in  the  emergency
passageway  they’d  set  up  behind  the  scenes.  He  almost
thought it was empty until he caught a glimpse of the red
shirt  he’d  seen  Brennan  wearing  earlier  on  the  ground
over in the corner.

His legs carried him there without his even having

to  think  about  it.  Brennan  lay  face  down  and  absolutely
still.  Johnny  knelt  beside  him  and  reached  out  slowly,
dread seeming to freeze the very air in his lungs, but when
his hand touched Brennan’s back, Brennan let out a pained
moan  that  made  the  breath  he’d  been  holding  burst  free
in a relieved whoosh.

“Bren?” Johnny turned him over gently. Brennan’s

eyes were closed, his skin pale and clammy. Johnny
pushed sweat-damp hair off his forehead. “Brennan?
Come on, Bren, please wake up. Please.”

Brennan moaned again, an agonized sound that

made Johnny’s stomach clench with worry. His eyelids
fluttered open and he looked up at Johnny with pain-
clouded eyes. “Johnny?”

Relief nearly made Johnny lightheaded. “Yeah. It’s

me. I’m here, baby. What’s wrong? Where are you hurt?”

“L-leg.”

Asylum

Johnny noticed it then. Brennan’s lower left pant

leg was drenched in blood. The relief he’d felt vanished in
a rush of fear. “Oh, God. What happened?”

“Fell. Think I… broke it.”
Johnny aimed the flashlight at Brennan’s leg and

leaned closer to inspect it. Almost immediately, he reared
back,  nausea  rising  fast  and  hard.  “Fuck.  Oh  shit.”
Brennan’s  jeans  were  torn  a  few  inches  below  his  knee
and peeking out from the hole in the denim was a shard of
bone  about  as  long  as  Johnny’s  middle  finger.  Not  only
was  Brennan’s  leg  broken,  but  the  bone  had  pierced
through the skin. Johnny couldn’t even imagine the kind of
pain he was in.

He glanced at Brennan’s face. His eyes were closed,

but  Johnny  couldn’t  tell  if  he’d  passed  out  again  or  if  he
was just trying to breathe through the agony. He fumbled
in  his  pocket  for  his  phone  and  speed-dialed  Cameron’s
number.

Cameron answered on the third ring. “Johnny? Did

you find him?”

“Yeah, but he’s hurt. His leg is broken. Are the cops

here yet?”

“They just got here. There are a few ambulances

too.”

“Well, send someone up. We’re on the third floor,

in the passageway behind the torture chamber.”

“Hang on.” Johnny heard a rustle and a couple of

muffled voices. A few seconds later, Cam was back on the
line. “They’re coming. Is he okay?”

“I think he might have passed out again.”
“How bad is it?”
“Bad.”
“Shit. Poor Bren. Look, I’ll see you when you get

down here. We can follow you guys in the Challenger.”

Piper Vaughn

“Okay.” Johnny ended the call and shoved the

phone  back  into  his  pocket.  Brennan  hadn’t  stirred  or
opened his eyes again, but his chest was moving steadily.
Johnny  reached  out  with  trembling  fingers  to  touch  his
cheek.  Brennan’s  skin  was  cool  and  perspiration  had
beaded  on  his  forehead  and  upper  lip.  Even  unconscious,
his face looked tense from the pain.

“They’re on their way.” Johnny grabbed one of

Brennan’s  hands  and  squeezed  lightly.  The  break  looked
bad, but it could be fixed. All things considered, his injuries
could  have  been  so  much  worse.  Johnny’s  heart  was  still
racing just imagining the possibilities. But what really killed
him  was  the  idea  that  something  awful  could  have
happened  to  Brennan,  that  Johnny  could  have  lost  him,
permanently lost him, and his last words to Brennan would
have been from that day in the car. The day he’d done his
best to drive Brennan away forever.

“Everything’s okay. You’re gonna be fine.”
He wasn’t sure if he was talking to Brennan or

himself.

Chapter Five

Brennan was released from the hospital on

Halloween  morning.  He’d  needed  surgery  to  install  the
rods  and  screws  that  would  realign  his  tibia  and  hold  the
bone  in  place  while  it  healed.  Johnny  found  out  from
Cameron  that  Brennan  had  fallen  over  one  of  the  metal
props  on  the  torture  chamber  set  after  being  shoved
during  the  initial  panic  when  the  power  went  out.  He’d
managed to drag himself into the emergency passageway
before  passing  out,  which  had  likely  saved  his  life.  If  he’d
stayed where he’d fallen, he might have been trampled in
the confusion.

Outside of one brief visit while Brennan was in

recovery from the surgery, Johnny hadn’t gone back to the
hospital.  He’d  sat  beside  Brennan  for  an  hour  while  he
slept  off  the  drugs,  holding  his  hand  and  wondering  if  he
had any real right to be there. After all, he’d been the one
to end things, and he worried that his continued presence
might send mixed signals. And the worst part of it was that
he  didn’t  have  a  clue  how  he  felt  or  what  he  wanted
anymore.

Johnny knew what he had with Brennan was more

than just lust. He enjoyed being around Bren. He always
had—even when Brennan was a scrawny, smart-mouthed
brat who followed him around with worship in his eyes. If
Johnny was the weather, moody and inconstant, then

Piper Vaughn

Brennan was the sun itself, consistently warm and bright.
His personality drew people in and held them captive.
They liked Brennan because it was impossible not to. And
Johnny was far from immune.

But it was hard to separate the memories of the

awkward  Brennan  of  his  childhood  from  the  older,  self-
assured  version  who’d  come  into  his  bedroom  that  first
night  and  taken  charge  of  the  situation  with  pure,  easy
confidence. If he were being completely honest, the new,
sexually  aggressive  Brennan  with  his  wicked  eyes  and
impish smile terrified Johnny as much as he turned him on.
He’d  never  wanted  anyone  the  way  he  wanted  Brennan
before,  not  with  that  wild  sort  of  desperation  that  made
him  lose  all  sight  of  caution  and  common  sense.  It  was
scary to think of how strongly Brennan affected him. And,
of course, there was the small matter of how Eddie would
react to the knowledge that his best friend since freshman
year of high school was sleeping with his younger brother.

Hell, who was he kidding? No one but himself,

obviously. His relationship with Eddie was the only reason
he’d fought his attraction to Brennan for so long. Years of
friendship versus a quick fuck or two, or a fling that might
burn out after a month? The decision had been simple. But
that was before, when he hadn’t known just how
thoroughly Brennan would get under his skin. He wanted
Brennan. In his life, at his side, in his bed. Oh God, yes, in
his bed. That much at least he knew. As to whether or not
it was love? Well, that was harder to say.

* * *

Asylum

“Brennan, stay up here. You can switch rooms with

Matt. Don’t even worry about moving your stuff now. We
can do that later.”

“I don’t want to switch rooms. I’m happy

downstairs.”

Johnny looked up from his laptop at the sound of

voices  at  the  top  of  the  basement  stairs.  So,  they  were
back  from  the  hospital,  then.  Brennan  sounded  a  bit
strained and Johnny imagined he was probably still in a lot
of  pain.  According  to  Cameron,  the  nursing  staff  had
handed him a few prescriptions and practically rushed him
out  the  door  the  moment  he  could  navigate  the  hallway
on his crutches.

“But it’ll be easier if you just—”
“Cam, I can do this, okay?”
Wondering what was going on, Johnny shut the

laptop  and  pushed  back  from  his  desk.  He  crossed  the
bedroom and paused in the doorway, shocked as all hell to
see  Brennan  trying  to  come  down  the  steps  on  his
crutches while Cameron stood anxiously behind him.

“What are you doing?” he asked in alarm.
Brennan’s head jerked up and one of his crutches

slipped, landing on the step below the one he’d been
aiming for. He managed to steady himself with Cameron’s
help, but the motion had jarred his whole body and his
face had gone deathly pale, his mouth bracketed by white
lines of pain.

Johnny rushed up the stairs to him and settled his

hands on Brennan’s narrow waist. “Let me help you.”

“I’m fine,” Brennan said tightly. “I don’t need—”
“Please.” Johnny kept his voice soft, his tone

pleading. “Please just let me.” After a moment, Brennan
nodded without meeting his eyes. Johnny glanced up at

Piper Vaughn

Cameron. “Will you bring the crutches down? I’ll carry him
the rest of the way.”

“Sure.”
Though it was obvious Bren wanted to protest, he

stayed silent as Johnny took the crutches from him and
handed them to Cameron.

“Put your arm around my neck,” Johnny instructed.

It was a bit awkward as they tried to maneuver while being
mindful of Brennan’s cast, but Johnny managed to scoop
him up, holding Brennan close to his chest as he carefully
descended the rest of the staircase.

Johnny was tempted to take Brennan into his own

room,  but  he  went  into  Brennan’s  instead.  He  carried
Brennan  all  the  way  to  the  bed  and  laid  him  back  against
the mountain of pillows in front of the headboard. “Do you
need  to  go  to  the  bathroom  or  anything?”  he  asked.
Brennan  shook  his  head,  his  cheeks  stained  pink  with
embarrassment.  “If  you  need  anything,  just  let  me  know,
okay?”

Cameron leaned the crutches against the wall

between the bed and the nightstand. “Same goes for me,
Bren. I’ll have my phone on me. Text if you need
anything.”

“I think I’m going to try to sleep for a while.”
Johnny recognized a dismissal when he heard one.

He followed Cameron out of the room and pulled the door
shut behind him.

Cameron turned to look at him. “Come upstairs,

will you? I need to talk to you.”

“Okay.”
They went upstairs to the kitchen, where Cameron

immediately set upon making some tea. He glanced over
his shoulder at Johnny as he filled the kettle with water.
“Do you want any?”

Asylum

“No, thanks.”
“He wouldn’t even consider moving to a room

upstairs,” Cameron said as he set the teakettle on the
burner and turned on the flame. “He missed you.”

“I missed him too.”
Cameron shook his head. “You should have stayed

at the hospital.”

“I didn’t want to confuse him, Cam.”
“It’s too late for that, don’t you think?” Cameron

leaned back against the counter and crossed his arms over
his chest. “Eddie’s coming to pick him up on Friday.”

Johnny stiffened. “What?”
“They talked yesterday. He told Eddie he was ready

to move.”

“Shit.” Johnny pulled out one of the chairs at the

kitchen table and slumped into it. “I was expecting
something like this, but I didn’t think it would be this
soon.”

Cameron sighed. “This is your last chance, Johnny.

If you have feelings for Brennan, you should tell him. You
shouldn’t let him go thinking you don’t love him.”

“I’m trying not to be selfish, Cam. And the truth is

that I… I just don’t know if…” Johnny trailed off with a
groan, raking his fingers through his hair. “It’s so easy with
you and Dean. You don’t have any doubts. But how do you
know? How can you be sure?”

“That it’s love?”
“Yeah.”
“You’ll know.” Cameron smiled, his expression

softening. “You can’t help but know. It’ll come to you one
moment, when you look at that person and you see all his
flaws, his quirks, his bad habits, and you suddenly realize
that none of it matters. All that matters is he’s perfect for
you and you for him. You’re perfect together.”

Piper Vaughn

Johnny gave a wry laugh. “You make it sound so

simple. If that were really the case, why don’t more people
stay together?”

Cameron shrugged. “It’ll be as simple as you let it

be.  Sometimes  I  think  it’s  part  of the human  condition to
overcomplicate things. But it really doesn’t have to be that
way.”  The  teakettle  started  to  whistle  and  Cameron
moved  to  turn  it  off.  “Do  you  want  me  to  stay  with  him
tonight?”

It was Fear Asylum’s last night open and the hours

had been extended for Halloween. Johnny knew the place
would be totally packed and the Asylum crew had planned
for  a  massive  afterhours  party,  for  which  they’d  been
selling  tickets  throughout  the  month.  In  the  past,  he’d
always  loved  working  the  holiday,  especially  when  Eddie
had been a part of the crew. But he couldn’t go. His heart
wouldn’t  be  in  it.  Because  it  was  down  in  that  basement,
lying in bed, alone and in pain, and he couldn’t walk away.
Not when he needed to make things right.

“No,” he said finally. “I’ll stay.”

* * *

When night had fallen and the rest of the crew had

already left to start their shift at Fear Asylum, Johnny used
the fancy cocoa mix Cameron kept in the pantry to make a
mug of hot chocolate for Brennan. He’d gone out that
afternoon to buy some popcorn balls and a bag of Reese’s
Peanut Butter Cups shaped like little pumpkins because he
knew they were Brennan’s favorite.

Johnny spiked the hot chocolate with a splash of

Baileys, loaded it up with whipped cream, and took it
downstairs with the bagful of goodies he’d picked up
earlier. He knew that Brennan loved Halloween as much as

Asylum

he  did,  but  for  the  first  time  Bren  was  laid  up  in  bed,
heartsick  and  miserable,  and  missing  all  of  the  fun  he’d
been  looking  forward  to  from  the  start  of  the  season.
Johnny  hoped  the  treats  would  serve  as  a  peace  offering
of sorts so they could talk while the house was empty.

He rapped lightly on Brennan’s door and twisted

open  the  knob  without  waiting  for  an  answer.  Brennan
was  sitting  partially  upright,  his  upper  body  reclining
against  the  pillows  that  lined  his  headboard.  He’d  been
watching a movie, Army of Darkness it looked like, but he
reached  for  the  remote  and  stopped  it  when  Johnny
crossed the room toward him.

“I come bearing gifts.” Johnny set the candy and

mug of hot chocolate on the nightstand. “I figured if you
couldn’t go to Halloween, I’d bring it to you.”

Brennan looked at the stuff Johnny had set down in

surprise. Smiling slightly, he reached for a Reese’s.
“Thanks.”

“Mind if I sit down?”
Bren hesitated for a moment then shrugged. “Go

ahead.”

Johnny settled onto the bed next to him, taking

care not to jostle the mattress too much. Bren’s left leg
was propped up on a pillow, the white plaster cast stark
against the dark red sheets. “You can turn the movie back
on if you want.”

“It’s cool. I was starting to get tired anyway. These

pain meds make me really sleepy.” Brennan picked up the
mug and blew on the surface of the hot chocolate before
taking a slow sip. He chuckled and wiped whipped cream
off his upper lip with the back of his hand. “Did you put
liquor in this?”

“Baileys,” Johnny answered with a smile. “Just a

splash.”

Piper Vaughn

Brennan took another sip and set the mug back

down. “Look, not that I don’t appreciate the gesture, but…
why? Are you doing this just because I got hurt?”

“No, I—I mean, yes, partially, but—” Johnny

cleared his throat and tried again. “I wanted to do
something to make you happy.”

“Why?” Brennan looked at him with wide amber

eyes.  His  hair  was  pulled  back  into  a  loose  ponytail  at  his
nape  and  he  looked  so  young,  almost  boyish,  without  it
surrounding  his  face  like  normal.  “Why  does  it  matter  to
you if I’m happy?”

“Why wouldn’t it matter?”
“Johnny—”
“You said you were tired. Did you want to turn the

light off? Maybe lie down for a bit?”

Brennan gaped at him. “You… you want to…?”
“Yeah. Turn the lamp off.”
Brennan looked confused but he obeyed. He

switched  off  the  lamp  and  then  adjusted  his  position  in
bed,  sinking  down  until  he  was  flat  on  his  back.  Johnny
reached for him and pulled him close, his fingers going to
the elastic that held Brennan’s hair in place and tugging it
free.

The TV was still on, bathing Brennan’s skin in a

bright blue glow. His eyes were dark as they searched
Johnny’s face. “What are we doing here, Johnny?”

Johnny slid down until their faces were level, their

noses nearly touching. “What do you want from me,
Brennan? What do you really want?”

“I already told you what I want.”
“But you said the last time that I had no idea. So

tell me again.”

“I want you. I want to be with you. But as an equal.

I don’t want you treating me like I’m just some dumb kid.”

Asylum

Johnny reached up to lay his palm on Brennan’s

cheek. “I don’t think of you that way. I know you’re not a
kid.”

“Why didn’t you stay?”
“What?”
“At the hospital. Cameron told me you were there

after I got out of surgery. Why did you leave?”

Johnny gave a half-shrug. “I was being an idiot, I

guess. I thought it would be… fuck, I don’t know what I
thought. I was trying not to be a selfish bastard. I’m sorry.”

Brennan was silent for a few moments. “I missed

you so much,” he said eventually, and Johnny knew he
wasn’t just referring to his time in the hospital. “Did you
miss me?”

“Yes.”
Brennan reached for him and Johnny slid even

closer, letting Brennan curl an arm around his waist and
nestle his face against the crook of his neck.

“I love you,” Brennan said, his voice muffled,

breath warm against the tender skin of Johnny’s throat.
“You know that, don’t you?”

“I know.”
“But I’m leaving on Friday unless you can tell me

there’s  a  reason  to  stay.”  Brennan  drew  back  far  enough
to peer into Johnny’s eyes. His expression was a mixture of
hope and longing and fear. He wanted so badly for Johnny
to give him a reason, Johnny could see that. But he could
also  see  the  anxiety  there,  in  Brennan’s  face,  the  worry
that  Johnny  might  reject  him  yet  again.  “Is  there  a
reason?”

Johnny looked at him for a long time. He searched

inside  himself  for  an  answer  and  found  it  there,  clear  as
day.  It  had  probably  been  there  from  the  very  beginning,
but  he’d  been  too  blind  to  recognize  it  for  what  it  was.

Piper Vaughn

“Every reason,” he answered, his fingertip tracing the
outline of Brennan’s lips.

Brennan smiled slightly. “All I need is one.”
“You have it, Bren.”
“Yeah, well, I need to hear it.”
“I love you.”
Bren’s smile widened into a grin. “There. Was that

so hard? Did you strain anything?”

Johnny smiled back and shook his head. “No. It felt

kind of good actually.”

“Say it again then.”
“Don’t push your luck, kid.”
Brennan laughed softly and kissed him. He tasted

of  chocolate  and  peanut  butter  and  Baileys  Irish  Cream,
and  underneath  it  all,  Johnny  could  taste  him,  Brennan,
like strawberries in summer and hot apple cider in winter
and everything good in between. Brennan kissed him long
and  slow  and  sweet;  then  he  pulled  back  with  a  smile  on
his lips. “So, are you asking me to stay?”

“I want you to stay,” Johnny admitted. “But what

about school? I don’t want you to give up on that. Not for
me or anyone else.”

Brennan’s smile faded. “What about Eddie?” he

asked instead of answering. “I know you were worried
about him finding out about us.”

Johnny’s stomach twisted at the mention of his

best friend’s name.  He was  terrified by  the  idea  of telling
Eddie  about  his  relationship  with  Brennan,  that  hadn’t
changed,  but  his  feelings  for  Brennan  were  stronger  than
his  fear.  “I’m  still  worried,  honestly.  I  can’t  imagine  him
being  okay  with  it,  at  least  not  right  away.  But  we’ll  deal
with it. We’ll get him to come around.”

“And if he won’t?”

Asylum

“Well, that would suck—” Understatement of the

century there. “—but I won’t let it change anything
between us.”

“You promise?”
“I’ll do my best.”
Brennan nodded. His eyes were warm and glowing

with  happiness,  belying the  seriousness  of  his  expression.
Staring into them made Johnny’s stomach twist again, but
in  a  good  way.  “That’s  fair  enough.  As  for  school,  I  can
start off with some online classes. And later, who knows?
Maybe  you’ll  finally  decide  to  put  down  roots
somewhere.”

“Well, I guess stranger things have happened,”

Johnny murmured as he snuck a hand under the hem of
Brennan’s T-shirt. He stroked the soft skin of Bren’s
abdomen and then slid it a bit lower.

“Hey,” Brennan said with laughter in his voice. “Do

you realize where your hand is?”

Johnny smiled, that same smile Brennan had used

on him all those weeks ago—confident, mischievous.
“Yeah.”

Brennan trembled as Johnny’s fingers wrapped

around him, his eyelids dropping shut. “So move it.”

Johnny nuzzled Brennan’s nose and dropped a

playful kiss on the tip. “I intend to.”

And then he did.

End

About Piper Vaughn

Piper  Vaughn  wrote  her  first  love  story  at  eleven  and
never looked back. Since then, she’s known that writing in
some form was exactly what she wanted to do. A reader at
the  core,  Piper  loves  nothing  more  than  getting  lost  in  a
great  book—fantasy,  young  adult,  romance,  she  loves
them all (and has a thousand book library to prove it!). She
grew up in Chicago, in an ethnically diverse neighborhood,
and loves to put faces and characters of every ethnicity in
her  stories,  so  her  fictional  worlds  are  as  colorful  as  the
real  one.  Above  all,  she  believes  that  everyone  needs  a
little true love in their life… even if it’s only in a book.

Visit Piper at:

Web site:

http://pipervaughn.com

Facebook:

http://facebook.com/pipervaughn

Twitter:

http://twitter.com/#!/pipervaughn

And her joint blog with M.J. O’Shea:

http://mjandpiper.blogspot.com

Other Books By

Piper Vaughn

Like rock stars? Check out Piper’s “Lucky Moon” series,
co-written with M.J. O’Shea, beginning with Moonlight
Becomes You. Available now from

Loose Id