by Abigail Roux
Thiago was almost disregarding the fact that Remy had actually shot Shawn. Shot
him! What had he been thinking? Yes, the action had saved Gray’s life. And yes, after a month of Shawn’s dealing with the guilt and hatred and misery, the only thing that would have kept him from killing Gray would have been to shoot him. Or shoot at
him. But did Remy have to shoot him in the arm? Couldn’t he have missed him, like he had Brandt? Or hit him somewhere a bit less painful? Well, Thiago supposed it
didn’t matter where you got shot, it was still painful, regardless.
Thiago shrugged it off and made his way back into the other room. He came
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to stand over the man tied to the banister and snarled menacingly at him.
“Thiago,” the Watcher said in mock courtesy.
“Bernard,” Thiago responded in the same tone. “You’ve got some explaining
to do.”
XXI.
CARL heard Gray and Remy come up the stairs, bickering and cursing at one another as they went.
“If you call me Romeo one more time, Boss, I swear to God–”
“You couldn’t thump me in the nose, the shape you’re in. Ow! Damn you! I
didn’t say it!”
“You were thinking it!”
“How do you know? I could’ve been thinking about… uh… ow!! Fucking
hell, that hurts! My fucking nose!”
Carl forced himself not to smile as Remy’s snickering echoed through the
otherwise silent upper level of the house.
Brandt sat on the bed next to Shawn, who had grudgingly surrendered to a
dose of the dreaded rubbing alcohol and a duct taping and was now propped up in the middle of the bed. Nikolaus sat in the corner, his head in his hands as he rocked slightly, and Carl leaned against the wall by the door.
Shawn’s shoulders slumped further as the bickering faded away, and Carl
looked at the man sympathetically. It must have been hell on him to hear Remy being chummy like that with someone else. Especially after a month of despairing and then being shot upon the happy reunion.
“Can anyone tell me what just happened?” Nikolaus asked after a long,
uncomfortable silence.
“Remy’s pissed off,” Shawn observed in a childish, surprised voice.
“Just a bit, mate,” Carl murmured in amusement.
“He shot me,” Shawn said in the same tone of voice.
Carl snorted before he could stop himself.
“Oh, that’s just great, Trigger. Just fucking great,” Brandt said angrily as he
got off the bed and stalked toward Carl.
Carl pushed away from the wall and flexed himself, preparing for a nice
brawl, and Brandt growled at him. Before any fur could fly, Thiago stepped into the room and looked at them all warily.
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“Everything okay in here?” he asked gruffly.
They all nodded, looking like naughty children who’d just been caught in the
act, and Thiago glared at them all before beckoning them to come with him.
Carl watched Brandt tuck Shawn in, despite the older man’s protests, and
waited for him in the hallway.
“Don’t be mad, Wally,” Carl whispered coaxingly, running his fingers
through Brandt’s thick hair and pulling his head down so he could kiss him on the forehead.
“Hmph,” Brandt offered as he tried to hide a grin, and they walked down the
stairs together, trailing after Thiago and Nikolaus.
Their visitor sat tied to the banister, looking at all of them with a self-
satisfied grin that Carl really felt needed to be kicked off his face.
“Gentlemen, this is Bernard,” Thiago said as he gestured to the man and took
a seat in one of the wingback chairs nearby. “He’s a Class One from the early days, as well as a state-of-the-art jackass. He also knows something that we don’t, and our job here today is to get it out of him.”
Bernard smiled unpleasantly at Thiago, and Thiago looked back at him
blankly.
“And how exactly do you go about getting a Class One agent to spill his
guts?” Nikolaus asked curiously.
Carl grinned wickedly and looked at the man, and Bernard’s eyes flickered
over him hesitantly.
“Filet knife,” Carl answered with a joyous growl.
XXII.
SHAWN waited until he heard the door to the master bedroom close. He waited still further until he was certain that no one was lurking outside, ready to pounce on him and force him back into bed. The duct tape was bad enough. It pulled at Shawn’s
chest hair every time he so much as blinked, he didn’t need Brandt sitting on him as well. Fucking duct tape. They couldn’t have found some real medical tape? Or a nice roll of linen, maybe?
He got out of bed carefully, wincing as the tape pulled, and he sat on the
edge of the bed, straining to hear what was going on. Finally, he sighed and hefted himself out of bed. He would have to get closer if he wanted to hear what was being said downstairs.
He shuffled out the door and looked both ways down the hall before making
his way to the railing, and he stood at the balcony listening to the conversation below.
They didn’t seem to be making much progress with the man whom Thiago was
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calling Bernard, but that would probably change as soon as Carl went all batshit
again. Shawn knew he would spill what he knew if Carl Travers stood over him with a knife in his hand.
Shawn leaned over the railing and looked down, then turned his head slightly
and looked down the hall toward the master bedroom as he listened.
Remy. He was so close, but Shawn couldn’t make himself get any closer.
The guilt and the pain were overwhelming, and knowing Remy was angry with him
made it all that much worse.
He looked at the door longingly for several seconds, and then returned his
gaze to the stairwell. He couldn’t see any of the action, but he could hear it. As he listened to Thiago explaining to the others how he knew Bernard, Shawn heard the
door at the end of the hall creak open slowly. His heartbeat quickened. He flicked his eyes to the side, but didn’t turn his head. He couldn’t bear to look the younger man in the eye.
Remy was dressed in nothing but a pair of white linen pajama bottoms and
Shawn’s eyes surreptitiously raked over the scars on Remy’s otherwise perfect,
tanned skin as the younger man walked silently toward him. The newest one; a nasty, jagged, glaring red oval, adorned his left shoulder. Shawn swallowed hard and ducked his head again, trying to fight back the nausea. He had done that to Remy.
“I’m sorry I shot you,” Remy said to him in a soft voice as he stopped in the
middle of the hallway and cocked his head to the side to listen.
“I deserved it,” Shawn responded quietly as Remy resumed his movement
and glided toward him.
“Maybe so,” Remy agreed. “But I’m still sorry.”
Remy approached him slowly, as he would a wild animal or a spooked
horse, and finally Shawn found him close enough that he could smell the other man.
He closed his eyes and savored the scent. When he opened them again, Remy stood
beside him, leaning over the railing with him. Shawn could sense that sort of
movement. Most people could, in fact, and it was a talent that could be honed. But Remy’s talent to move soundlessly, and what was more, to move indiscernibly, was without question a natural thing. It was also highly frustrating at times.
“You must no
t be too hurt, if you can still move like that,” Shawn observed
with a small smile.
Remy cocked his head and looked at Shawn expressionlessly. Shawn
swallowed nervously and finally turned his head to look at Remy. He let his eyes
roam over Remy’s features.
“You cut your hair,” he observed sadly. He’d enjoyed Remy’s curls, though
he hadn’t had much time with them. Remy’s hair had been short when they’d met up
in South Dakota and had grown long during their separation.
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“Actually, Gray cut it,” Remy informed him without moving a muscle other
than those required for speech.
“Why?” Shawn asked as anger and jealousy flared briefly through his body.
It all went back to Gray Kincaid, didn’t it?
“It became a liability,” Remy answered flatly. “Why were you handcuffed to
the bed, Shawn?”
“What?”
“Why were you handcuffed to the bed?” Remy repeated slowly.
Shawn hadn’t known that Remy had seen him in bed. He really had gotten
slack. Of course, better men than Shawn’d had Remy sneak up on them. Shawn was
just lucky he had lived through it.
“Did they think you were a liability?” Remy asked in the same flat voice
after Shawn didn’t answer his question.
Shawn blinked at him in surprise. “What?”
“Hmm,” Remy responded as he looked at Shawn appraisingly. “Why then?”
“I… I was giving them a spot of trouble,” Shawn muttered, blushing at the
thought. He couldn’t let Remy know how many times he’d tried to end his life. It was too shameful for him to think of.
Remy’s eyes narrowed and he turned to look at Shawn. Shawn looked up to
see the flat black of Remy’s Kill Mode, and he swallowed nervously. If Remy wanted to do the job for him, then so be it. Shawn had already established that you could toss someone over the balcony.
“I was so angry with you,” Remy said through gritted teeth, “I could taste
your blood at night.”
Shawn looked at him in shock and despair as a shout sounded from below.
“Is that all you have, you bastards?” Bernard’s strained voice shouted.
“What, that? That was just the stretching exercise, son,” Gray drawled from
below. “Wait ’til we get started before you start your evil monologue, ’kay?”
Shawn frowned and Remy’s eyes flickered. “He’s very good at what he
does,” Remy murmured.
“And has he been doing it to you?” Shawn asked in a low voice, knowing
that it was the wrong thing to say, but unable to stop himself.
Remy’s jaw tightened and he rested his elbows on the balcony once more.
“We’ve got a lot to talk about,” he stated grimly. They stood in silence, listening to the occasional thump of fist hitting flesh from below. “What’s a Hunter, Shawn?”
Remy asked in a quiet, dangerous voice.
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Shawn’s blood seemed to run cold as he stood there, and his body went
completely still as his mind raced, trying to come up with an appropriate response.
There was no point in avoiding this conversation, though every instinct Shawn had told him to dance around the issue or just flat out lie.
But Remy knew. No wonder he’d shot him.
“When did you find out?” he asked in a defeated voice.
“You mean, at what point in our five years together did I discover that every
word you said was a lie? A simple means to an end?” Remy hissed angrily as he
finally lost control and turned around to face Shawn. He pushed at Shawn’s shoulder and pain flared though Shawn’s body as he stumbled backward. “Well, you didn’t
complete that fucking mission, Shawn. Whoops! Remy didn’t die!” the younger man
said with another shove.
“Remy, please,” Shawn begged desperately as Remy backed him up against
the wall. “I tried to tell you, I tried to–”
“Five years!” Remy hissed.
Shawn swallowed with difficulty and looked into Remy’s enraged black
eyes.
“I’ve spent the last month thinking of how I’d have you suffer. Thinking of
how every time you looked me in the eye and opened your mouth, it was a line. When did they put you on me, Shawn? Were you supposed to kill me? Did they threaten you when we came limping back into the Facility together? Hmm? Why did you stick
with me all this time after they cleared me, Shawn?”
“Remy, please let me explain.”
“Fuck you, Shawn!” Remy growled angrily, his voice still so low that the
others wouldn’t be able to hear him. “Your explanations always involve orders and loyalty, and I don’t want to fucking hear them! I spent every night plotting painful ways for you to die and then every fucking morning I would wake up with memories, Shawn. I couldn’t get you out of my fucking head! I could smell you. Feel you there with me, and so help me God, if I knew I wouldn’t blow my fucking brains out right after I slit your throat, I would do it,” he said as he turned around and ran his hands through his short hair in agitation.
Shawn blinked at him in surprise. It had been roundabout and scattered, but
had Remy just forgiven him? “Remy?”
“I would!” Remy protested. He turned and looked at Shawn wearily. “If I
thought I’d be able to exist without you, I’d kill you.”
Shawn nodded. He certainly knew how that felt. He had lived through five
years of that feeling.
Remy went completely still, and for a brief moment Shawn thought he was
going to attack him anyway. Then, Remy launched himself at Shawn, disregarding
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both their injuries, and wrapped his arms around Shawn’s neck as he kissed him
thoroughly.
XXIII.
NIKOLAUS winced as Gray’s fist made contact with Bernard’s exposed torso once
more, and he forced himself not to look away. There was a certain moral question that Nikolaus was dealing with that the others didn’t seem to have trouble with; if he couldn’t stand to look at what was being done, was it right to be a party to it?
Nikolaus decided that the question was something he would have to deal with later; he wanted answers just as badly as the others did.
“What are you up to, Bernie?” Gray asked as he paced back and forth in
front of the man. They’d retied him, with his hands over his head, and he slumped slightly against the banister of the staircase. He was still grinning, though.
“Brandt?” Gray requested as he turned around to look at the other man. “I
assume you have a lighter with you somewhere?”
“In my pants,” Brandt said grudgingly as he nodded his head toward the
stairs. There had been a silent agreement to treat Gray as one of their own in front of Bernard, to show a united front, if nothing else.
“Are you sure?” Gray asked as he held up a silver lighter and showed it to
Brandt. Brandt’s eyes flashed angrily and he growled deep in his chest. Gray tossed it to him and pointed at Bernard, who was still grinning.
“Guess that explains who grabbed your ass,” Carl murmured. “Did you fuck
with the windows, too?”
Bernard looked at him blankly.
“Why would he take Brandt’s lighter?” Nikolaus whispered in Thiago’s ear.
“I can only assume he feared losing us,” Thiago murmured. “He knew
Brandt wouldn’t leave that behind, so he took it and probably bugg
ed it with the
intention of replacing it. Is that why you’re in here getting yourself caught?” Thiago asked in a louder voice. “Were you trying to return it?”
“If your whirlwind up there hadn’t jumped on me, I wouldn’t have been
caught,” Bernard said testily, the first words he had spoken other than taunting.
“You’re not the only ones who were on that tour, yeah? I saw those windows, too.
You stand in an old house like this and have someone jump on you from above.
Fucking leather coat.”
Nikolaus actually snickered. The thought of what Remy must have looked
like in the dark as he jumped over the banister, his leather coat flaring out behind him, was enough to make anyone piss their pants.
“You didn’t open the windows?” Brandt asked in a small voice.
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Thiago cleared his throat and glared at them all. “I think that’s not exactly
the point,” he admonished. “Bernard, be a good man and tell us who sent you and
why.”
“Fuck you, Thiago. You know better than to think I’ll be telling you
anything, you may as well go ahead and kill me.”
Carl took a step closer and put his face right up to Bernard’s. “Did you know
that even if you hang someone by his toes and slit his throat, you won’t get all the blood out?” he asked pleasantly.
Bernard stared at him and blinked several times. “I heard the tour guide, too,
there, Sport. Interesting trivia, all the same.”
“Hmm. Trivia, yes,” Carl murmured thoughtfully. “I ask, you see, because I
don’t think it’s true. I think I could get all the blood out,” Carl said in a low voice as he ran the serrated edge of a knife along Bernard’s cheek. “I’d sure like to try, anyway.”
Nikolaus didn’t know where Carl had pulled the knife from, or how it had
made its way into Carl’s hand so quickly, but he swallowed with just as much
difficulty as Bernard did, and thanked God that Carl was on their side. The knife sliced into the skin and Bernard hissed and flinched away.