Mr. Wolfe Llewellyn, J. (each kindness read aloud .txt) 📖

He stopped talking about the Beckett collection long enough to listen to the sounds around him. He smiled. Ambrosio grinned back at him. They both enjoyed the eternal swish that gave the name to the dining style of shabu-shabu.

Yoshi returned with their first dish of raw beef and opened up the cooking pot inserted in the middle of the table. He lowered the condiments he knew the two men liked onto the table, along with a plate of vegetables and bowls of udon noodles and rice. Within seconds, a waiter hurried over with two pots of warm sake.

"Perfect, thank you," Ambrosio said.

Mr. Wolfe watched his right-hand man drop pieces of thinly sliced beef into the boiling water. He was so hungry, he forked a slice of raw beef and chewed it quickly.

Ah, sublime. He caught the brief look of reproach on Ambrosio's face and mouthed, sorry to him. It was hard to wait, but soon, his dinner plate became pleasantly filled with fragrant meat and vegetables.

Ambrosio hated to see him eat raw meat, fretting about bacteria and parasites. It was the one area in which Mr. Wolfe toed the line. Normally he wouldn't scarf down uncooked meat in front of Ambrosio but he was so hungry he couldn't wait. He picked up a piece of cooked beef. Perfect.

He chewed and swallowed thoughtfully. It amazed him how good a piece of meat boiled in water could be. When Ambrosio had first brought him here, Mr. Wolfe had balked at the idea. Then he understood. The beef was of such high quality it needed very little to enhance it. Boiling it surprisingly brought out all the juicy flavors.

Ambrosio kept cooking and Mr. Wolfe kept eating and drinking.

The sake only made everything taste better and took the edge off Mr. Wolfe's anxiety. He stopped fretting about the clothes and focused instead on the succulent Chinese cabbage.

"We'll have another round. Ten pieces of beef, please," he overheard Ambrosio saying and his toes curled inside his boots.

When at last he lifted his head and found Ambrosio's warm gaze meeting his, Mr. Wolfe sighed with contentment.

The waiter brought their check, which Ambrosio paid with cash. As he left a hefty tip, he glanced back at Mr. Wolfe.

"Do you want to go back and get your SUV?"

"No." Mr. Wolfe had no desire to drive all the way back to the airport. He wanted to go home.

"Sure?" Ambrosio asked.

"I'm very sure."

Ambrosio smiled.

Outside, they walked the two blocks to where their car was parked on Central Avenue. Mr. Wolfe was surprised the SUV was still in one piece. They hadn't parked in the safest neighborhood. Far from it.

They climbed inside, Ambrosio adjusting the internal temperature of the vehicle. It had cooled off some outside, but Mr. Wolfe was hot. Damned hot. And in the best way possible.

Ambrosio lifted his gorgeous ass off the driver's seat and reached into his back pocket. He slipped on his wedding ring.

"You're sure about leaving your SUV at the warehouse?"

"Positive. I'm also sure that more than anything else in the world I want you to take me home and fuck my brains out."

Ambrosio's grin was huge as he slipped Mr. Wolfe's wedding ring onto his finger, then gave him a quick kiss. "Great minds, my love, think alike."

Chapter 3

At their sumptuous June Street home in the original "Hollywood", the district of Hancock Park, Ambrosio raced into the driveway and turned off the ignition.

"You have no idea how hard it is to look at you all day and not be able to touch you," he said, his voice cracking.

"Oh, sweetheart. The feeling is mutual."

For a moment the two men stared at one another, then their mouths met in a searing kiss that got the windows all steamy.

Ambrosio laughed, breaking off their embrace. "We're the last of the red-hot lovers," he said as he stepped out of the SUV.

The two-story Tudor house covered in ivy was their haven. They'd bought it for just over a million dollars four years ago when the real estate market crashed in LA.

It had been recently valued at over three million dollars thanks to their careful refurbishment. This had been no easy task. Dealing with the notoriously difficult and nosey Hancock Park Homeowners' Association had proved tougher than dealing with the city regarding permits. They had been warned by the previous owner who'd given up and sold the house to the couple.

Mr. Wolfe walked around to the rear of the property to enter the back way. He loved coming here into the garden at all hours of the day and night. He adored seeing the pagoda erected for their wedding three years ago when same-sex marriage had been legal in California.

After a lifetime of loneliness, it had been the best day of his life. Marriage had been more important to Ambrosio than it had to Mr. Wolfe, until the big day arrived.

They'd held the wedding here, building their rose and ivy bedecked pagoda. They'd invited all their close friends. Mr. Wolfe prided himself on the fact not a single celebrity had been on their list. All their friends were workers, like they. Seamstresses, pattern makers, designers...and Ambrosio's beloved sister, Mireille, who was a senior buttonhole maker and pocket marker for a major design company in Japan.

Mr. Wolfe hadn't met Mireille before but now loved her almost as much as he loved Ambrosio. He gazed past the pagoda to the guesthouse designed as a miniature replica of their Tudor mansion.

Once a month, on the night of the full moon, Mr. Wolfe retired there under lock and key to ride out his change from polite and efficient costume archivist to homicidal maniac. He still had no idea why his cherished and adored Ambrosio put up with his affliction, but Ambrosio said it was nothing.

Nothing!

Mr. Wolfe craved raw, bloody meat during those wretched hours, but thanks to Ambrosio's care, had not killed a living creature for eleven years. He tried not to think of his dreaded curse and the trail of death he'd left