Now, his anklet had failed, and he’d been beaten, stabbed, and damn near tortured in response.
Nick started crying. If he kept simply taking this, being a prisoner and being humiliated and used and mistreated and even being held captive by his best friend, he’d end up broken at best and dead at worst. He had to face facts and run, and end this once and for all.
He wouldn’t be able to see or even talk to John again. Or Mari, or Alice, or Wash or Kelly or Sara. He’d never be able to return to his apartment, New York City, or even the United States.
He’d never again be Nick Aster. He pressed his face into the pillow and sobbed.
NICK
“Nick, sweetheart?”
Mari sat down on the bed beside him.
Nick sniffed. “Sorry.”
Mari swung her legs up onto the bed and practically dragged him into her arms. “Sweetie - you are so loved. Don’t cry alone.”
He pushed against her, crying. He’d never done this, sobbed openly in front of another person. Never experienced being held and caressed while he grieved. Every gentle touch seemed to fuel a new wave of anguished memories and grief for precious things lost, because it held the discovery of a precious thing found.
John entered, his awkward uncertainty audible in his faltering approach. Nick choked back his sobs. This was one weakness too much to show John, the man who had to rely on him in life or death situations. One thing too much to burden a responsible and compassionate man with.
“It’s - okay, Nick.” John’s words were as hesitant as his steps. Nick couldn’t help remembering how useless John said he felt around sobbing women. Let alone sobbing felons.
John’s gentle hand came to rest on his back, and the agent sat down beside them. “You don’t have to be tough for me.”
Nick actually tried to sob again, but couldn’t. Tears still trickled from his eyes, but that desperate emotion had dissipated. Part of it was self-inhibition. But even more so was the strength John lent with his presence. “I’m tough because of you.”
Mari kissed him on the cheek. “Welcome to the club.”
“Nick, you don’t have to be brave,” said John. “You don’t have to be anything but you.”
Nick loved the sound of John’s voice. It was sober and gentle and strong. It was intelligent compassion and understanding.
John left his hand on Nick’s back, and pressed an ice pack against the worst bruises on his face. Mari kept holding him, and this was as cherished as Nick could ever remember feeling.
He was physically and emotionally exhausted, the drugs in his system demanding sleep, every drop of emotion wrung from him and leaving him gasping. The physical pain, mild thanks to the Oxycontin in his system, had been worsened by sobbing, and he lacked the strength to move.
Strong arms and soft hands positioned his body, laying him on his right side. John slipped a pillow under his head and spread a blanket over him. He knew what happened next. They would leave him, alone in an upstairs bedroom.
“Please don’t leave me,” whispered Nick.
His mother had never listened.
The Langleys did.
“You want us to sleep with you, Nick?” asked Mari, stroking his shoulder.
Nick nodded. He had some fuzzy idea he wasn’t supposed to say yes, that he would be mad at himself tomorrow, but couldn’t be bothered to figure out why or care.
Mari lay down beside him, at his back, put her arm around his chest, and held him in the gentlest embrace he’d ever experienced. John brought pillows and dragged over blankets, and finally lay down on his back near Nick’s right.
Something was wrong. Mari was there, John wasn’t. There was a gap. Where was he? Nick reached out, found an arm, and tugged.
The warm, solid rock he was looking for scooted closer, and he extended his arm across John’s chest so as not to loose track of him again, pressed his face against John’s shoulder, and that was the last thing he was aware of until morning.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Fear Among Friends
NICK
“Um - did I start sobbing last night and demand you guys sleep with me? I really hope I’m remembering that wrong.”
John grinned. “You really are very cuddly when you’re drugged.”
“I haven’t had a sleepover pajama party since I was twelve,” said Mari. “This was fun, except for the part where you almost died yesterday.”
Nick let out a whimper of despair. And to his dismay, caught himself smiling. He couldn’t recall having a more wonderful night’s sleep in his entire life.
“You are not even remotely allowed to be embarrassed,” said Mari.
A familiar name was uttered on the TV running in the background, and Nick snapped his head around.
“-found murdered in a high-security federal prison this morning. Mr. Grossman was convicted on charges of tax fraud, racketeering, and attempted murder after an extensive FBI investigation. Unnamed sources inside the prison have speculated that the killing was a revenge murder carried out by the Sicilian mob.”
“That was our case.” John was riveted to the screen. “He threatened to have us both killed when we arrested him, remember?”
Nick nodded. “I wonder if there’s still a hit out on me this morning.”
John stared him down with a hard set to his jaw. “Nick, did you have anything to do with this murder?”
“No.” Nick’s voice came out squeaky. “No. I swear.” His head spun, and he gulped away nausea.
John reached out and touched Nick’s upper arm with the back of his hand. “I believe you.”
Nick looked away. “I didn’t know the guy I helped with the painting was mafia. He never asked to be born into that world. He was just a terrified and completely heartbroken, sweet kid who wanted to die.”
John tried to blink the emotion out of his eyes. “I remember when you were the sweet, terrified, heartbroken kid in a cell.”
Nick gripped a fistful of the blankets. “Yeah. There’s no way I don’t help someone who’s going through that.”
And that doesn’t change the fact that a man was just murdered because of me. Or that inmates were injured and probably severely mistreated for protecting me.
“Nick.” John’s voice was sharp, and his gaze was stern. “What happens as a result of your bad acts, that’s on you. And is that ever a lesson you need to learn. As long as you keep running with scissors, people are gonna get cut. Not just you. But the bad acts of other people’re on them. You don’t get to blame yourself for what they do.”
“Get to?” muttered Nick. John didn’t have the most finely honed sense of the dark.
“Yes, get to. Because that way you get to take responsibility for something you know in your heart you didn’t do, and get to dodge your real culpability.”
“Hon?” Mari looked horrified.
“It’s okay,” said Nick. John’s words stung, but his honesty cut both ways. When John extended comfort and reassurance, it was to be trusted.
And unfortunately, he was right.
Mari leaned down and kissed Nick on the forehead. Then she kissed John. “I have to go into work now. You boys take good care of each other.”
NICK
There was a tight knot in Nick’s stomach that wouldn’t go away. His heart was beating too fast, and his breathing was too slow. He couldn’t relax, regardless of all the mental gymnastics he put himself through.
You’re safe.
You’re out of there.
You’re not going back.
It’s not going to happen again.
You’d survive if it did.
His chest hurt, too. Everything hurt. It hurt to move. Hurt to hold still.
And when John walked into the room, it was like seeing a life raft in the middle of a raging ocean.
“Help.” Nick’s plea wasn’t premeditated, it just came out.
John gave him a steady, gentle look, squeezed his shoulder, and sat down on the bed next to him. “Scared?
”
Nick nodded. “Not logically.”
“It is logical, with what you’ve been through,” said John. “And with a background of five years in a prison at the mercy of other people.”
Nick’s blood pressure spiked, and the knot in his already aching stomach made him gasp. He tried to force himself to remember the good people, the decent everyday life and routine at the prison. It usually worked, but right now everything was twisted and all he felt was fear. The sickness of vulnerability and the pain of being yanked into an alternate dimension of cruelty.
Ow.
He gasped at the physical pain and dizziness. John put a hand on his arm, a blessedly warm, steady feeling.
“Have you been taking your pain meds?” asked John.
Huh?
Oh.
“I - was stressing out - I kinda forgot. That’s maybe why everything I think makes me hurt.”
John stood up. “Did that - that didn’t make any sense, did it?” asked Nick.
“It made perfect sense,” said John. He fetched water and the orange prescription bottles, and helped Nick take his pills.
“I feel sick,” said Nick. “I might throw those up. I’m sorry, don’t know why this is -”
“Shush,” interrupted John. “You’re badly beat up. You were tortured. You’ve been stabbed, you almost died from blood loss, and you’ve undergone emergency surgery. Everything’s gonna suck right now. You need to stay on your meds, ‘cause the last thing you need is to feel any more pain ‘n you absolutely have to.”
Nick nodded, and took a deep breath, releasing it in relief. It was too soon for the meds to have kicked in, but the presence of the one person he trusted with his soul was easing some of the worst of it.
“Now,” said John, setting the pill bottles aside and putting his hand on Nick’s shoulder blade and rubbing it with calm reassurance.
“I hate being vulnerable,” Nick blurted. “I never - want to be under anyone’s power ever again. I’m going to scream the next time someone handcuffs me. I’m so afraid I’m gonna throw up on their shoes and punch them right in the face because I can’t handle the idea of going through this again or even letting myself be put in a position where it’s a possibility, and of course that’s the one thing I could do that’d actually give them a real reason to beat the hell out of me.”
Nick gulped, and he was so dizzy, and weak, and sick at the memories that he felt himself loose control of his body and just sort of wobble. He wanted to scream. He’d left this behind, and here it was haunting him again, happening all over again.
He felt a hand on each of his shoulders, and John tugging him against his upper body and holding him. Just short of passing out, he leaned against that support for all he was worth, thankfully saved by it from oblivion. It hurt, and he was sick, and dizzy, and he moaned desperate desire for it all to stop.
“Are you okay?” asked John, his voice quiet.
Nick nodded yes, and decided moving his head was a very bad idea.
John patted his shoulder, and it was the most reassuring sensation in the world. “I don’t think you hate being vulnerable any more’n the average person. I think you handle it really well. I think you just hate being vulnerable to assholes and sadists.”
“Thass true,” said Nick, becoming aware that he was in John’s arms, physically incapacitated and emotionally crippled. His deepest fears laid raw in front of his boss and the man who held him prisoner and was protecting him from being re-arrested. That was vulnerable all right.
And it was okay.
“You ever get - just scared of the world?” asked Nick.
John nodded. “At times like this....yes. Terrified.” He paused for a minute. “I get really shaken when it’s guys on my side of the fence doing - horrible, criminal things.”
“I don’t want to die in jail,” said Nick. “I don’t want to die alone or in handcuffs or being beaten. I’m not that afraid to die, but - I want it to be fast, or at least with a friend there to hold me.”
John held him.
“Are you afraid to die?” asked Nick.
“I don’t want to die,” said John. “But I don’t think anyone who’s truly afraid of death lasts long in a job where ‘might get violently murdered’ is one of the hazards.”
“So what do you fear?” asked Nick.
“Lots of things. Anything happening to Mari, or you, or any of my people. Shooting some innocent guy holding a cell phone. Wrongly convicting someone. Being tortured, dying in a fire - what happened to you the other day encapsulates a lot of my fears. Horrible cruelty for no reason, especially inflicted on a good person. Having that done to someone I love is one of my biggest fears, and it just happened.”
“Scared?” asked Nick, his voice soft.
“Yeah,” said John.
“You think you ever have sent an innocent person to prison?” asked Nick. “Because I promise you, I did time with some innocent men. You think violent crime is bad? Try what it does to someone to be wrongly convicted.”
John shivered. “I really, truly don’t think so. The cases I’ve had any doubt about, at all, and even the ones I was certain of but the suspect maintained their innocence, I spent countless late nights digging and double-checking.”
“What if it’d stuck when Sasha Allieio framed me?”
John met his gaze. “If you looked me in the eye and swore you didn’t do it, and continued to do so, I would have never stopped digging until I found evidence to exonerate you. I can’t swear I’d have believed you, but I would’ve gone to the ends of the earth regardless.”
Nick looked back at John for a long time. He needed to believe that. There was a small part of him that was afraid of John. This was the man who had hunted him without remorse. Who had put him in prison, and could do so again with a single phone call. Who had arrested him when he was innocent, with as little hesitation as when he was guilty. Who could and would shoot him or beat the hell out of him if circumstances ever came to that.
John was larger, stronger, tougher, harder, and in some ways, smarter than he was. Maybe that was why it melted Nick when FBI Special Agent John Langley treated him as a friend. Prey didn’t expect compassion and gentleness from the predator who had him pinned by the throat.
John saw the fear, and reached out and touched the side of Nick’s face. “I take no pleasure in locking you up, Nick.”
Nick had to smile, in relief and amusement. That was deeply true, and shallowly....not.
“Yeah, you do. Gleeful bastard.”
John grinned too. “You’re just so much fun to catch.”
“You could try a little harder not to smirk every single time you put that anklet on me,” teased Nick.
“I’ll do that the day you stop being the smuggest man alive,” John countered.
Nick tapped his head. “Think I know when this happened.”
“I didn’t want to ask....” said John, his face going serious again.
“It was the first time I’d experienced real violence up close and personal. Everyone told me what changed in me was shock, then they said it was trauma, and then it was just who I was. At first they called me a brave kid, then I grew up and it was reckless and foolhardy. Personally, I just thought I’d learned to cope with life.”
“You wanna talk about the incident?” asked John.
Nick hesitated. “Maybe - yes. But not now.”
“Okay. I’m here any time.”
Nick chuckled. “That hurt you to say, didn’t it?”
John shrugged and gave him a sheepish look. “Investigator is just a word for nosy guy with badge.”
“This whole brain damage thing....it’s scary. I’ve spent my life trying to find love, and friendship, and financial security, and to learn and be - I know I’m smart and artistic, I never wanted to waste that, and I don’t know if you believe me but I do want to be a good person. And now I’m Nick Aster, brain damaged criminal and cowering victim with - really few friends. I feel about five min
utes from living on a street corner drawing pictures on cardboard for loose change.”
His stomach remembered it had gotten holes punched in it and been cut open, and his back arched in response to a powerful spasm of pain. That made all of his other aching muscles complain too, and he gritted his teeth.
“Hang in there,” said John. “It won’t hurt forever.”
Broken Blue Lines: Love. Hate. Criminal Justice.: An FBI Crime Drama / LGBT+ Love Story Page 9