The Reluctant Dom (35 page)

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Chapter 21

Kaden and Leah's wedding anniversary was July nineteenth. The three of them celebrated together at a beach resort in St. Pete at Kaden's request. Seth tried to gracefully suggest he stay home or get a separate room but Kaden wouldn't hear of it.

“I want you there, man,” he'd quietly insisted one morning while they were discussing it without Leah.

“But that's for you guys to celebrate.” In Seth's mind the phrase “last anniversary” had to be pounded back into its dark hole with a mental sledgehammer before it started him crying.

“You're a part of us. I want you there.”

Seth studied him. “Why?”

Kaden wouldn't answer at first. Finally, “Please don't make me say it.”

Seth closed his eyes. “Okay,” he softly said.

It was a good weekend. Seth did his best to take as many pictures of the two of them together as he could. Leah did let Seth get his way once. He sent them out for a sunset walk together, alone, after taking pictures of them on the beach. The next night, Seth gave in and joined them, the three of them walking hand-in-hand in the white sand as the sun disappeared beyond the horizon into the Gulf.

Seth did his best to take pictures in a way that wouldn't accentuate Kaden's weight loss.

* * * *

In early October, an unwelcomed late-season guest by the name of Hurricane Mabel formed in the Caribbean Sea and worked her way north. Seth kept a close eye on it. By the time it drew south of Cuba, he knew he needed to prepare.

The corrugated metal window shutters were neatly stacked in the corner of the garage. He sent Leah out for supplies and several gallons of diesel for the back-up generator he'd installed that spring. Kaden walked outside as Seth started moving the shutters to place them by their respective windows.

“What can I do?” he asked. He'd lost more weight, and his skin tone didn't look good. The jaundice had started.

Seth shook his head. “You can chill out and keep me company. You get hurt, Leah will have my nuts in a sling.”

Kaden frowned. “Come on, I'm not fragile. Let me help.”

“No. The last thing I need you doing is stressing yourself out. You want to help? Go move anything you can off the lanai into the dining room.”

“I'm not a fucking invalid!”

The anger in Kaden's voice made Seth turn.

“Dude, I'm not saying you are. I don't need you wearing yourself out. Leah needs you. Anything you do that stresses you or tires you out, that cuts down on the time.” It was a cheap shot, Seth knew it. But he also didn't want Kaden getting hurt. His strength and balance had deteriorated over the past month. “Seriously, if you can clear out the lanai, that will help me. And walk around the property, make sure there's nothing that can blow around, make room for Leah's car and the bike in the garage. That's stuff you can do and I won't have to. It'll save me time, seriously.”

Kaden scrubbed his face with his hands. “I'm sorry.”

“No, don't apologize.” He sensed an imminent meltdown. Better now than if Leah was home.

Sure enough. Kaden closed his eyes. Seth cringed when he saw his friend's tears. “I just feel fucking useless.”

Seth put his arms around his friend, held him, tried not to think about how he could feel nearly every rib and vertebrae through Kaden's shirt. “You're not useless, buddy,” he gently said. He felt Kaden crying, didn't acknowledge it, didn't try to comfort him the way he comforted Leah. Kade didn't want that, he just needed to vent. “You don't make my job any easier if you wear yourself out and make yourself sicker faster.”

Kaden eventually nodded and stepped away, turned, wiped his face. “Thanks, man. Sometimes I just...” He faced Seth. “Sometimes I just wish it was over. And then I feel fucking selfish.”

Seth shook his head. “No, don't feel like that. I know you're in pain.” He knew Leah had to see it but she didn't talk about it.

* * * *

Two days later, they sat in the living room and played Monopoly while the storm howled outside. They'd lost cable an hour earlier. The lights flickered several times but they hadn't lost power yet. Leah sat on the couch with Kaden while Seth sat on the floor.

He'd noticed, especially over the past few weeks, that Kaden had stepped back in many ways. Seth suspected it was a combination of having his hands full dealing with his illness, he felt like shit, and that he was trying to get both Seth and Leah used to Seth's new role.

Seth also noticed he was now the hard ass, the one who had to stand up to Leah and discipline her when she needed it. Kaden would let her get away with anything and everything.

He wasn't sure if that was intentional on Kaden's part or not. But now Seth led every session, took the lead in keeping her focused and calm.

He tried not to think about it. It was hard enough doing it. Especially when she turned the full force of her eyes on him.

He'd creatively used the blindfold on her one day when she tried to sucker him into getting her way, made her stay blindfolded for over an hour while she went about her daily business, blindly groping her way around the house. Kaden had laughed and deferred to Seth and his creative use of corrective measures.

At least it worked.

Later, when the men were alone, Kaden had smiled. “You're getting the hang of it, buddy.”

The power finally went out. When the lights didn't come back on, Seth grabbed the battery powered lantern he'd kept at his side. “I'll go check the genny.”

Fortunately, the generator breaker panel was inside. For some reason the genny main had tripped, probably because of the frequent power surges. When he flipped it, it rumbled to life outside and the lights came on. When the power was restored, it would automatically trigger the genny to shut down.

He returned to the living room. “I suggest shutting off anything we don't need.” He'd already unplugged the stereo system and TV in the living room to protect them from surges.

They tuned their radio to a local station simulcasting a Sarasota TV station and listened as the weatherman gave them a play-by-play of Mabel's torturously slow landfall on the Florida peninsula.

By seven o'clock it was pitch black outside and Kaden suggested going to bed early. It was either that or sit and listen to the wind howl outside and the eerie sound of things thumping against the house.

The next morning they still had no power but the worst of the storm was over even though gusts of wind and trailing rain bands still swept through their area.

Seth went outside and did a quick check of the yard. Kaden's truck and his own car, parked by the house, were undamaged, just covered with leaves plastered on by wind and rain. Some small limbs down throughout the yard, one on top of the house but it didn't look like any tiles were damaged. He couldn't tell from the ground and it was too windy to get a ladder out to go up and look. No rain had leaked through as far as he could tell from checking the ceilings inside. Until he could get into the attic for closer inspection, he wouldn't know for sure. He'd have to replace some of the screens on the lanai, which was to be expected and something he could do himself.

Kaden stepped outside. “Well?”

“I think we're okay. I'll start taking the shutters down tomorrow. Too windy to do it today.”

“With both of us doing it, it won't take long.”

Seth didn't reply, pretended he was studying the power lines running along the edge of the property. They looked intact.

“I said, with both of us doing it—”

“I heard you.”

“You were ignoring me.”

Seth turned to him and dropped his voice. “Let me do it. Come on, it's
my
job, okay? This kind of shit is what I can do. Let me do it.”

Kaden's face hardened. For a moment, Seth thought he was in for another confrontation.

Then Kade laughed. “You're not going to melt down on me like Leah over your laundry, are you?”

“I just might if you don't let me do my job.”

Kaden looked up at the gunmetal grey sky and took a deep breath, blew it out. “Okay. I still feel useless.”

“No, you need to change your thinking like you've done all along. I feel like a fucking freeloader. This kind of shit, I can do it and I do it well. At least one thing I don't totally fuck up. Let
me
have
my
pride, dude.”

Kaden met his gaze. “Sure you don't want to go into psychology instead of nursing?”

“Fuck you.” But Seth smiled.
Crisis averted.

“You wish. Not in your wildest dreams, buddy.”

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Chapter 22

Kaden didn't feel up to going out to shop for Christmas gifts. That relieved Seth, because he worried about Kaden picking up a cold. Seth helped him shop online or made mall runs for him, conversing over the phone to coordinate his purchases for Leah.

Seth put up the holiday lights and outdoor decorations, adding even more blow-ups and menagerie animals to the displays than the previous year.

Kaden helped with some of it, sometimes simply sitting in a lawn chair and untangling and testing lights for Seth. He didn't push the issue, didn't try to wear himself out. Many times Leah would join them, helping Seth or just sitting on a blanket by Kaden's feet, her head resting against his leg.

None of them spoke the obvious, that it was Kaden's last Christmas. They also didn't make references to “next” Christmas.

It was too painful.

When Seth flipped the switch on the lights the night before Thanksgiving, Kaden's face lit as brightly as the display, one of the few times Seth witnessed true joy in his friend in the past month. Seth knew the pain had to be miserable but Kaden rarely complained.

Leah and Kaden slowly walked through the displays, her arm around his waist to steady him, as he looked at everything. Seth grabbed the video camera and filmed them. In the dark, against the soft glow of the colored lights, Kade's skin tone looked nearly normal if you could ignore the deep hollows forming in his cheeks and under his eyes.

And he looked happy.

She would want these memories. Seth knew he did.

They put up the Christmas tree. Seth teared up when Leah hung their “First Christmas” ornament prominently at the front of the tree, next to her one with Kaden.

Where did the fucking year go?
Too fast.
Way
too fast.

Thanksgiving was very quiet and subdued, just Tony, Ed, Kaden's brother and sister-in-law, and Ben and Helen joined them. Leah had made no mention of holiday parties, one worry off Seth's plate. If she had he would have been forced to put his foot down. It was too close to the end for him to try to pretend to be okay in front of people he barely knew, and Kaden didn't want others seeing him like this.

* * * *

Seth was taking Kaden's blood pressure one morning while Leah was in the shower. Kaden grabbed his wrist. “Thank you.”

Seth briefly met his friend's gaze and nodded, focusing on what he was doing. It hurt to look into Kaden's grey eyes and see them yellowed by jaundice.

It was two days before Leah's birthday. Kaden could still keep water, clear fluids, and some starches like rice and mashed potatoes down. They'd have to stop the Ensure soon, that was starting to upset his stomach. It wouldn't be long before he was down to water and broth, and then...

Seth had quit weighing him the first of December. It was too hard emotionally to document the decline. By now he knew Kaden had to be under one-thirty. It was stupid and pointless to continue.

When they needed groceries, Seth usually forced Leah to go alone, leaving Kaden time to talk with Seth about things that needed discussing outside her hearing. Seth didn't want her to know his biggest fear, that Kaden might die and he didn't want her alone with him when it happened. His second greatest fear was Kaden's weakened condition, that he might fall and not be able to get up and Leah wouldn't be able to help him.

It kept her mind focused, got her out of the house for a little while. Even though Kaden got out of bed and walked around and was still continent, he spent most of his time either in bed or on the couch in the living room.

On the morning of Leah's birthday, Kaden produced a tiny box and handed it to her. Seth knew its contents because he'd wrapped it for Kaden.

She smiled as she fingered the small silver tags, with both Kaden and Seth's initials engraved on them. Then she leaned over and gently hugged him. “Thank you, Master.”

Seth's present was an intricately braided silver locking choker necklace, similar to her other day collar. It already bore a matching engraved tag.

She hugged him, hard. He heard her barely choked back sob as she pressed her face against his chest. “Thank you, Sir,” she whispered.

“Well, let's put it on you and see how it looks,” Kaden said.

She leaned in and held her hair up while Kaden made the switch.

“It's beautiful, love,” he said with a smile. “Now you've got another collar in your collection. Sir picked this one out for you.”

Kaden wasn't fooling Seth. He probably wasn't fooling Leah, either, unless she was really burying her head in the sand. Seth knew damn well why Kaden insisted on Seth ordering the necklace. He wanted Leah to get used to the fact that she'd be wearing other collars in her life, not just the ones he'd bought for her. The dual-engraved tags were yet another tactic, helping ease her through the transition as gently as possible under the circumstances. Kaden hadn't pushed the issue sooner and knew he couldn't put it off any longer.

* * * *

Christmas morning, Seth awoke and held his breath as he watched Kaden's face. Kaden's chest rose as he took a breath.

Seth closed his eyes and breathed a sigh of relief.
Thank you, Jesus.

Any day but today.
They'd made it through Leah's birthday. If they could at least make it until December twenty-sixth that was fine with him. After that...

After that, every day was numbered. Kaden refused doctor recommended IV fluids and nutrients that would keep him going a little longer. He was down to water, broth, and pediatric electrolyte solution. The lever had dropped to the lower end on Seth's mental gauge. Nearly pegged out at E.