It was so telling of Nick’s personality, the hidden part of him only a few people got to see.
He must have written the notes in shorthand or some sort of code, though, because it read like nonsense. Kelly placed the notepad back where he’d found it and sighed deeply, then hunted for the remote. He might sleep if the television was going.
He found the remote resting on top of a book beside the lamp: Mysteries of the Golden and Rosy Cross.
Kelly frowned at the title. Nick liked adventure books, especially the ones that added a little historical mystery to the story. Maybe Kelly could read himself to sleep and he wouldn’t risk waking Nick with the sound of the TV.
When he opened the book, though, a sheet of paper fell out. Kelly scrambled for it before it could flutter to the floor or disappear into the couch cushions. It was the same kind of paper as in the Moleskine notepad Nick carried around.
It had obviously been torn away, and on it were two grids, like tic-tac-toe boards, and two Xs, all with symbols in each empty space. A pigpen cipher: a simple substitution cipher that usually used dots instead of symbols. Kelly had taught the kids at the camp he worked at in Colorado how to do these, trying to get them interested in linguistics.
Kelly had his thumb in the pages the note had been stuck between, and on them he found the same sort of cipher, this time with the correct series of dots, and notes explaining how it was used. Not that Nick needed to look up a pigpen cipher; he was the one who’d taught Kelly how to do them.
Kelly flipped through the rest of the book. It wasn’t a novel after al , but a book about secret societies, specifically one called the Rosicrucians. Kelly had never heard of them.
“What are you up to, Nicko?”
After a few more minutes of contemplating the cipher, which he couldn’t figure out because the symbols were foreign to him, it occurred to him that this might have to do with a case Nick was working on. He slipped the paper into the book and set it back where he’d found it.
A yawn caught him off guard, and he clicked the lamp off and made his way carefully below to the main cabin. Nick was still and silent, his nightmares no longer plaguing him. It was a relief to slide under the covers beside him and have him curl almost immediately around Kelly.
Nick’s hand was warm on Kelly’s bare stomach, his fingers curling against Kelly’s abs. Kelly carefully placed his hand over Nick’s, Nick’s eyelashes fluttered and his nose curled in his sleep. Kelly closed his eyes and rolled in Nick’s embrace until he had cuddled closer and Nick’s arms enveloped him.
Nick woke with a gasp.
“It’s me, babe,” Kelly whispered against Nick’s chest. “It’s Doc, you’re safe.”
Nick tightened his grip and pulled Kelly closer. “Hey,” he said, his deep voice even gruffer with sleep. “You okay?”
Kelly pushed his head back so he could see Nick’s face.
Nick was still half-asleep, his eyes washed of their usual green in the darkness. His brow was furrowed. It wasn’t unusual for him to be concerned when he woke with Kelly in his arms like this; he could be cuddling, or he could be choking Kelly unconscious.
Kelly kissed his chin, then scooted up so he could reach Nick’s lips. Nick hummed into the kiss.
“I’m fine,” Kelly said. “Couldn’t sleep.”
Kelly rolled onto his back, pul ing Nick with him. Nick curled around him in a way that still surprised Kelly, resting his head on Kelly’s chest and throwing a leg over Kelly’s hips.
Nick was about as alpha top as a man could get, but when it came to cuddling, he had no compunctions about being held.
Kelly wrapped his arm around Nick’s shoulder and squeezed him tight.
“Boat still throws you off, huh?” Nick mumbled against Kelly’s chest.
Kelly nodded as he ran his fingers through Nick’s hair.
When they’d been discharged from the armed services, Kelly had gone home to Colorado and stayed there in a cabin he’d built with his own two hands and a very dedicated earthmover.
He’d grown accustomed to the smells of pine and snow and earth, the sounds of the wind whispering through branches and animals skittering through the underbrush coming from his open windows.
The waves lapping at the hull near his head were a sound from the past he hadn’t thought he’d sleep to again. The hustle and bustle of Boston in the distance was completely foreign to him. All the times he’d visited Nick before, he’d always been too drunk by nightfall to care.
He stuffed his nose into Nick’s curls and inhaled deeply.
Nick smelled of the sea, salty and cool. He always had, even in the middle of the desert with the hot sun pounding down on their backs or climbing the freezing shale mountains of Afghanistan. Or maybe the sea had always smelled of Nick.
Kelly had a hard time deciphering which came first in his mind.
“We can get a hotel, if you want,” Nick offered. He was waking up, his voice becoming clear and strong even as he rested his head against Kelly’s chest. “You’re here for another two weeks, no point in you not sleeping the whole time.”
Kelly’s lips twitched on a sigh. “I’d rather be here.”
Nick rested his chin against Kelly’s chest, rol ing over to his stomach and gazing up at him. Kelly stroked his hair, then let his fingers travel down his back, tracing hard muscles under bare skin. Nick shivered when Kelly’s fingers trailed over one of the long scars on his back.
“I need to get used to it anyway, right?” Kelly asked, but the question caused a flurry of butterflies in his stomach. He and Nick hadn’t talked much about their future. In fact, they’d only gotten as far as telling each other they were in it for the long haul, but they still didn’t have details worked out. Where would they go, what would they do? Would they compromise and move somewhere new, would one of them quit his job, or would they share time between both homes like they’d been doing? They hadn’t even begun to think of any of that stuff.
Nick had asked Kelly to marry him not long ago, but he’d been fresh out of surgery to donate a piece of his liver to his dying father, and so drugged that Kelly wondered if Nick remembered anything that had happened that day. He’d been told after Nick’s surgery that the surgeons had been forced to give Nick ketamine, which explained why Nick had hal ucinated for a solid week after he’d gotten out of the hospital. He’d spent most of it rambling about killing an old colleague of theirs named Liam Bell and telling Kelly he was beautiful.