When they’d walked into Lionheart – Rooster for the second time, and Red for the first – Much had met them with a bored, put-upon expression and walked them to a locker room. “No one else will come in,” he promised, sulky and teenagerish, and left them alone. Rooster sent Red in first, and now stood outside, letting the cool concrete wall hold his weight, breathing in and out in a slow, regular rhythm. Trying not to think too much about any one thing.
Red had been inside a long time.
“Okay,” he said, automatically. Then: “Quiet.” He cast a glance down the hall; once inside the main stone structure, the Lionheart facility was made smaller and more modern and usable by hallway, conference rooms, and bright electrical lighting. He could have been in a military facility anywhere in the world, its exposed ceiling pipes and its bleach-scented cleanliness a sort of comfort.
“She’s been through a lot,” Deshawn said.
He didn’t have to say that neither of them knew exactly what she’d been through. Through the chaos of the escape, and then the nerve-wracking ride back up into the mountains overlaid with the loud chop of the rotors, there hadn’t been a chance to talk about her captivity.
Rooster recalled something she’d said once, years ago, something she’d brushed off, and tried to laugh about, but which had tightened the skin around her eyes and mouth until her smile was a brittle mask. “I think they were going to try to breed us. Maybe even to each other.” With other children she’d claimed were her siblings.
His hands closed into fists inside his hoodie pocket.
If the way he clapped his shoulder was any indication, Deshawn knew it. “Maybe this isn’t the time to have this conversation, but I think you probably already know this: you two can’t keep going like you have been. Running. I don’t how the Institute keeps finding you, but they do. You guys can’t keep doing this on your own anymore.”
Rooster sighed, but nodded. He knew that. To be honest, he’d known that two towns and two shitty hotels ago. But he hadn’t wanted to believe it.
“I talked to Rob before Double Dee and I flew out to get you,” Deshawn continued. “There’s a place here for you – both of you. If you want it.”
Rooster searched his friend’s face, thinking for at least the tenth time in the last few days that he’d never really known him…but that wasn’t true, was it? He hadn’t known about Lionheart. About werewolves, and storybook heroes made flesh. But he’d known that Deshawn was the sort of person who wanted to help others; that if he offered safe harbor, he meant it.
“Is this you telling me I can stay as a friend? Or is this a job offer from Rob?”
“Both,” Deshawn said, hand tightening, eye contact steady. “You don’t have to decide right away.” He squeezed one last time and step back. “Talk it over with Red. When y’all are ready, come to the mess hall. It’s Tuck’s night to cook.”
Tuck. Another mage.
Rooster wasn’t sure how he felt about that, but he thought it might, might be a very good thing for Red to have a chance to talk to someone like her. Someone who could answer her questions without wanting to lay her out on a table and “breed her.”
He raked a hand through his hair. “Yeah. Thanks, man.”
~*~
The showers were the communal kind, with stainless steel walls, and no curtains. Red felt small, exposed, and chilled as she shed her clothes and left them folded on the bench beside the fresh ones Rooster had dug out of her bag for her. But the boy – Much? – with the snarling mouth and beautiful hair had promised they’d be left alone. The locker room stretched empty and gleaming around her, so she cranked on the hot water and stepped beneath the spray when it started to steam.
When the jets hit her, skin immediately pinking under the heat, she realized that the chill wasn’t physical; it resided in some deep untouchable place beneath her breastbone.
Someone had set out a fresh bar of Ivory soap, still in the box, and a bottle of Head & Shoulders. Masculine, functional scents. She reached for them, hands only shaking a little.
The problem, she reflected, as she shampooed her hair, was that everything had gone right. And so, so much of it could have gone horribly wrong.
Staying at the Institute, becoming Vlad’s…mage. His left hand? She still wasn’t clear on the details. Would that involve…sex? Would she be a kept pet? She feared so, yes. All of that had left her chest tight with panic; she’d wanted to cry, and kick, and scream. But at the end of the day, she had power. She was valuable. While Rooster – so precious, and brave, and damaged – was only a regular human. He had no value for the Institute, and they could have killed him – would have.
That was unthinkable.
She finished up quickly, not wanting to linger, needing to see Rooster standing in front of her, suddenly, alive and unharmed. When she soaped her arms, she noted that the marks from the cuffs, the scrapes and pinpricks of their spikes, had already faded, looking days old rather than just hours.
It was too quiet in the locker room when she shut off the water. She struggled into the clothes Rooster had left, the t-shirt and yoga pants clinging to her wet skin and making it difficult, wrung her hair out over the drain, and went to find him.
Rooster stood just outside the door, hands in his pockets, the wall looking like the only thing that held him up. It wasn’t the shakiness of deep pain, though; only regular exhaustion.
Red let out a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding and wrapped her arms around his waist. Pressed her face into his chest, the firm curve of muscle warm beneath the sweatshirt.
“Oh,” he said with a touch of surprise, and wriggled his hands loose so he could put his arms around her in turn.
She took a deep breath and let it out slow, allowing herself to accept the reality of his presence. He’d come to get her. Had come into that awful place to find her…
Her throat ached.
“How did you find me?” Her voice came out pitiful. She snugged her face tighter against him.
“That was all Rob and his guys. I was just along for the ride.”
“Not true.” She turned her head a fraction, and could see his hand on her shoulder. Not gripping, not hovering; his touch had always been a blend of respectful, but sure. Full of caring. It was his left hand – his bad hand. The back of it still bore a spiderweb scrawl of thin, silvery scars. The gunshot wounds in the forest she’d healed with one touch; she’d felt the bullets worm their way from his flesh; felt his body reknitting. But the old hurts, the ones that were already scars the first time they’d met, she’d only been able to smooth and suppress.
Her gift only worked on fresh wounds. The old ones would always be a part of him, as unshakeable as the sun lines at the corners of his eyes.
In her own selfish way, she loved the marks. They proved he was a person who’d made sacrifices; someone who, despite his stoic silence, felt deeply, and passionately.
She felt his face in her hair, the warmth of his breath against her scalp. “Deshawn said we could stay if we wanted.”
She’d already figured as much, but nodded. Anxiety tugged lightly at her stomach. She trusted Deshawn, and she was grateful for Lionheart’s help keeping Rooster safe. But. They were warriors. They weren’t the Institute, but they had a mission. Rooster was a Marine, and she was an engineered weapon. What little she’d seen of Rob Locksley, he didn’t seem the type to let resources go to waste.
No, she told herself firmly. If they asked for their help, it wouldn’t be the same. Not even a little bit.
She eased back a fraction so she could tip her head back, rest her chin on his chest and see his face. “What do you think?”
She wasn’t expecting the anguish that she found in his expression. His gaze slid away from hers and his mouth tucked in at the corners, a frown that looked restrained. “I think I can’t keep you safe.”
“Rooster.”
“So.” He shrugged, uncomfortable. “I think these people are okay. And I don’t know what else to
do.”
He stood head and shoulders above her, but she wanted to gather him close and stroke his hair, soothe him as if he was a child.
She stared at him until he finally made eye contact again. “I don’t care where we are, so long as we’re together,” she told him, willing him to understand how much she meant that.
He stared at her a long moment, studying, until the little crease between his brows smoothed, and a softness stole across his stern features.
To her surprise, he lifted a hand and carefully tucked her damp hair behind her ear, callused them brushing gently across her cheek afterward, again and again.
“You came,” she said again, softer this time, the wonder and love settling over her afresh.
The tiniest smile touched his mouth. “Always.”
When he leaned down, she stood up on her toes so she could meet the kiss halfway.
46
“If I don’t go back to work, I’ll get fired,” Sasha reasoned. He gripped the doorframe between the kitchen and the living room and told himself it was just to have something to do with his hand, and not because he was swaying on his feet again.
Withdrawal, Trina had declared it, a hand pressed to his sweat-damp forehead. She’d prescribed – non-professionally, of course – plenty of rest, fluids, and foods that would be gentle on his stomach. Sasha knew that his wolf metabolism would purge his system sooner than that of a human, and that this was only temporary, but he felt terrible. Shaking from the inside out, in turns hot and then cold, nauseated and crampy.
At the kitchen stove, Nikita hummed a disagreeing sound and flipped another pancake onto the plate he held, already heaped to a level that made Sasha’s stomachache worse. “No working. Working isn’t resting.”
Sasha huffed with annoyance, and told himself the sound wasn’t as unsteady as it had been yesterday. (It was, but he refused to acknowledge the truth.) “But I missed so many days already–”
Nikita set the plate down too forcefully with a sound like it might break, and turned to face Sasha, expression carefully blank – too blank – his knuckles white where he gripped the spatula. “I said no.”
Sasha gave a truly sad excuse for a growl. “You’re not my mother.”
Something flickered in Nikita’s eyes before he doubled down on the blank impassivity. “No. She would make you borscht instead of pancakes. Like a good nurse.”
He moved with deliberate care as he set the spatula aside, moved the skillet off the eye, and took the plate to the table where a fork, napkin, and bottle of syrup already waited. He pointed at the pulled-back chair. “Come eat.”
Sasha’s stomach grumbled, even as his tongue grew thick and salty with revulsion at the idea. Instead, he folded his arms, stuck his chin out and said, “I can’t lose that job. The tips alone–”
“Shut up about the fucking job,” Nikita snapped in Russian. “You can’t even comb your hair, so I don’t want to hear one more word about the job.”
And there was the anger that Nikita had been keeping so carefully under wraps the last three days.
In the car on the drive back, and now here at home in their apartment, Nikita had been unfailingly gentle and attentive. Soft smiles and gentles touches. Offers of blankets, and socks, cool washcloths on Sasha’s overheated throat and face. He’d cooked, and puttered quietly around the apartment; the floorboards didn’t even creak when he tiptoed from one room to the next. He’d helped Sasha bathe when he was too shaky to stand upright in the shower, had washed his hair and used the much-hated hair dryer to blow it out after. He’d been as sweet and overwhelming as any mother.
He hadn’t been much like himself at all. Not once had he shown the fury Sasha knew he must feel.
It was a relief to see it now.
“I know you’re very angry,” Sasha said.
A muscle ticked in Nikita’s jaw.
“Because I was stupid enough to let myself get caught–”
“No.” Nikita sliced a hand through the air to cut him off, eyes flashing again. “I am – I am – enraged. That they hurt you. That they touched you. I’m not angry with you.”
“But…” The room titled, and Sasha didn’t think it was just the dizziness. “I was so stupid. I went off alone, and I didn’t think…”
He trailed off when Nikita let out a growl of his own, this one sharp and punched-out, forceful. “That was stupid. You were stupid. But I can’t–” He sucked in a sudden breath, and then couldn’t seem to stop.
He was hyperventilating.
He was panicking.
Oh, Nik.
Sasha pushed off from the doorframe and went clumsily around the table to throw his arms around his best friend, who was very much melting down. Sasha pressed his face into Nikita’s throat and whimpered, wondering if this was the first time since this whole ordeal began that Nikita had allowed himself to feel any way about it. Had he strapped his emotions down tight under that old black coat and put one foot in front of the other? Yes. That was his way.
“I’m sorry,” Sasha said, stroking the tense line of his back. “I’m sorry I made you worry.”
Nikita pressed his nose and lips to Sasha’s temple, his breaths short and harsh. He squeezed Sasha tight, and tried, unsuccessfully, to swallow the wounded sounds that gathered in the back of his throat.
“You take very good care of me.”
Nikita sniffed hard. Sasha felt warm, wet droplets at his hairline.
They stood that way for a long time, the morning sunlight stretching slowly across the floorboards like a lazy cat.
In a suspiciously thick voice, Nikita said, “I’ll talk to Brian. He won’t fire you.” Because he had Rasputin’s gift for persuasion, and he would use it in this case, to ensure Sasha got to keep the job he liked best.
“Thank you.” Sasha blew a warm breath against the side of his neck, gratified by the goosebumps it raised. “Help me eat the pancakes? My stomach still isn’t so good.”
Nikita made an assenting sound and let Sasha pull back.
Nikita was the last to let go.
They sat across from each other at their wobbly café table and Sasha smothered the pancakes in syrup, to which Nikita rolled his eyes. They were red-rimmed, but Sasha didn’t comment.
Instead, he said, “Tell me what happened.” Because he’d felt too poorly up ‘til now to hear the whole story.
Nikita told it in a bored voice, which was no less than Sasha expected. But his fingers twitched on the tabletop when he spoke of meeting Trina’s family – his family. Sasha ached for him, thinking of Kolya, the son as an old man, meeting his unchanged, unknown father. He wanted to crawl into Nikita’s lap, but forced himself to shovel in pancakes instead.
“That was stupid,” he said when Nikita talked about walking straight in the front door of the manor.
Nikita shrugged. “But it worked.”
“Because you had more help than you expected.”
“Hmm. It worked out.”
“You said that.”
“I’m saying it again. That’s all there is to it.”
A dark worry blossoming, Sasha set his fork down. What he’d managed to eat so far rolled over ominously in his stomach. “Nik. It was a suicide mission.”
Nikita studied the fake wood grain of the tabletop.
“Did you…would you have cared if you died?”
Nikita’s head lifted, eyes slate gray in the late morning light. “As long as you escaped, I didn’t care what happened to me.”
Sasha groaned. “Ugh. You are terrible.”
Nikita tilted his head.
“No, you are. Are you so– Do you not– How do you think I would feel?” His voice cracked. “If you died. Do you think I would be okay?”
Nikita went very still.
“What do you think I would do? Shrug, and say, ‘Oh well, he didn’t care if he died, so I don’t care either.’ Do you think I would find a new roommate? Do you think I would be even close to alright?” His voice shook, and it had
nothing to do with withdrawal. “Or you so selfish that you don’t care what that would do to me? Or are you just an asshole?”
Nikita’s throat moved as he swallowed. “You know I don’t think that.”
“Then why are you so quick to sacrifice yourself?”
“Because I can’t…” The words grated out of him. “I can’t think when…” His chest lifted and fell, quick shallow breaths again.
Sasha did go get in his lap that time, though the kitchen chair groaned and threatened to collapse. Though there wasn’t room. He tucked his head under Nikita’s chin and was grateful for the hand that lifted immediately to run through his hair.
“I think,” he mused aloud, “we’re what they call codependent.”
Nikita snorted.
“Promise me something.” When Nikita didn’t respond, Sasha cupped the back of his neck and squeezed. “Promise.”
“Yes, yes, alright.”
“No more suicide missions. No matter what. That goes for both of us.”
Nikita petted his hair some more. Faintly: “Alright.”
“Nik?”
“Hmm?”
“Will they come after us? Vlad, he–” A shiver stole through his body.
“No, bratishka. They won’t.”
Another silence fell, this one peaceful, warm with the comfort of closeness.
“Nik?” Sasha asked after a while, as an idea struck. “What happened to Val?”
Nikita stiffened, just a moment, one second of pause, and then his fingers continued sliding through Sasha’s hair, down around the curve of his skull. But that pause was all Sasha needed to know.
“He didn’t get out, did he?” A sweeping sadness filled Sasha like a wave.
“He might have, we don’t know,” Nikita hedged.
“But you don’t think he did.”
Nikita sighed. “I think it isn’t likely.”
Sasha whimpered.
“He made his own decision,” Nikita said, firmly. “I went there for you, not him, and he knew that.”
“Nik. Val’s the one who told me how to turn you – to save you. He’s the reason we’re here now, together.”
Red Rooster (Sons of Rome Book 2) Page 46