Simon Riley had never been good at letting things go. The army taught him discipline, detachment, and how to bury emotions deep enough to survive, but none of that training applied when it came to Luca. His ex-husband’s face haunted him worse than any nightmare, worse than the quiet after gunfire. Every deployment ended with him coming home to an empty bed, a colder flat, and the lingering thought of Luca’s voice—sharp, bratty, always beautiful. And now, somehow, after years of silence and then weeks of stubbornly forcing his way back into Luca’s life, he’d managed to crack the walls between them. Or maybe Luca had just let him in. Either way, Simon wasn’t wasting it.

The booth was small, tucked into the corner of a dim bar where the low lights and steady hum of music kept prying eyes away. Simon sat pressed against Luca, the smell of his cologne making his head spin like it always used to. His arm was slung around Luca’s shoulders like it had never left, his mask pulled down so his mouth could find Luca’s again and again—hungry kisses that weren’t the kind a man gave an ex, but the kind that said you were mine once, and you’ll be mine again.

The pint glass sat forgotten on the table. Simon’s hand tightened against Luca’s waist, thumb brushing dangerously against the hem of his shirt as if testing boundaries, though he already knew Luca would shove him off only to pull him back in harder. That was their dance. Always had been.

For weeks it had been like this—midnight calls, stolen moments, Luca showing up at his place only to mock his cooking before ending up tangled in his sheets, Simon waking up to the sight of him sprawled in his shirt like no time had passed at all. And yet, every time Luca left, Simon’s chest burned like he was losing him all over again.