“Not...good." Stefano pressed his lips together."Okay. Don't speak I'll touch you, okay?""You do," Stefano answered. You do touch me.”

“Tell me why I shouldn’t shoot you,” Stefano murmured. Low, intimate, just between them. “Fun . . . would be over too fast?”

“One touch from you...,” water coated his lips, gathered in thick drops on his dark lashes, “makes me feel more than a whole goddamned orgy.”

“If I touched you, that’d be it.” Dan shook his head, “Damn, how the fuck am I going to make you understand?” Pleading, almost. “You are everything, don’t you get it? You are the Afghan mountains, the damned red dust, the endless sky. You were my home, and more often than not, also my reason. You are unlike all the others, unlike anyone I shag, because when I touch you, it’s not just a touch, it’s eleven years of heaven and hell.”

“Dan didn’t want to say anything, but the words were unstoppable. “I fucking love you. Don’t leave me. You’ve got to find me.” Again, fucking tears. Vadim shook his head, then pressed his face into the crook of Dan’s shoulder, hoped to hide his weakness and felt like a man condemned to die. “I will... find you. If it’s the last thing I’ll do, I’ll come back. Nothing will stop me.”

“Silvio said with a fond smile. "That was when I knew you meant it.""Meant what?""That you care about me." Silvio took the helmet again and stared at it like a postmodern Hamlet. "Franco told you about Toppolino. You remembered. I knew you cared about me.""Of course I do. I love you, Silvio." He didn't cringe inwardly when Silvio's answer wasn't the one his wife gave him immediately. Silvio wasn't good at this, and he accepted it.Silvio smiled and turned toward the door. "Same thing.”

“You’re with me,” Dan murmured against Vadim’s lips. “In my thoughts, my heart, my mind, no matter what I am doing. I goddamned need you, and I want you—always.”