“No! I never got the chance!”
“What do you think he would have said to Sean?”
Aaron asked.
“He hates Sean. He could have said anything;
anything at all to hurt him or make him angry.”
“Whatever he said, it must have been vile for Sean to have reacted like that,” Caroline offered.
“Sean believed him! Sean fucking believed him!”
Yana began to pace again. “How in the hell could Sean have believed anything Jimmy would say without asking me first?” Yana mumbled to himself more than the others in the room. “Son of a fucking bitch!” He walked over to the closet and pulled out his bag and started stuffing clothes in.
“What are you going to do?” Aaron asked.
“What do you think I’m going to do? I’m going home. If Sean can believe some lies an old ex-boyfriend tells about me, then he doesn’t have much faith in me or our relationship. Shit! He didn’t even give me a chance. He just picked up and walked out. Well fuck him!”
Aaron and Caroline exchanged looks of exasperation.
“Why don’t you come stay with us for a while?
We’ll find Sean and get this all cleared up,” Caroline offered.
“It seems pretty clear to me, Caroline. Sean has no faith in me and he doesn’t trust me. Period!”
“I think you should wait a bit, Yana, give Sean a chance to explain. No telling what Jimmy said to him.”
“I don’t care! I don’t give a fuck! If he doesn’t trust me; then we have nothing. I’m going home.”
A second later, Aaron and Caroline stood alone in the middle of the room. Yana had transported home.
“Oh, my God! What are we going to do?” Caroline went into Aaron’s comforting arms.
“I don’t know. Where do you think Sean would go?
Maybe we can find him.”
“I haven’t a clue. He has no family that I know of.
Just a brother he seldom ever sees. I doubt he’d go there.”
“Wasn’t there some talk a while back about a cabin somewhere?” Aaron asked.
“A cabin?” Caroline asked as they get into the elevator. “Yes, I do remember them saying something about a cabin but I don’t have any idea if it belonged to Sean or maybe something they rented or borrowed.”
“Looks like we’ve got a long night ahead of us,”
Aaron said with a sigh.
“Yeah. Let’s go home.”
CHAPTER FOUR
Sean carried the paper bag with six bottles of Cutty Sark to the cabin door. He fumbled with the keys but got it opened and went in. Dark, dank and musty, but he didn’t care. He didn’t even take the time to go out back and turn the generator on. He found some candles on the mantle and lit them then sat down on the couch, opened a bottle and upended it, not even going into the kitchen for a glass.
He couldn’t remember ever feeling so low; wanting to get drunk and blot out all thoughts. He didn’t want to think or remember. Sean tilted the bottle up and took several more swallows. The liquor burned its way into his system and Sean remembered the last time he got drunk— five years ago after his mother’s funeral. He’d wanted to spend time with his brother, Patrick, and his family afterwards but ended up being pulled aside and told, in no uncertain terms, he was not welcome.
That had been a bad time for him and worthy of a ten day binge. He and his brother had been so close growing up. Not just brothers but best friends. Until they became teenagers, and Sean made the mistake of confiding to three-years-older Patrick about a crush he had on a football player. He remembered the look of disgust on his brother’s face and could still feel the sting of the smack he had received and the long ranting lecture about the evils of homosexuality. Things were never the same between them after that.
Patrick had left the next year for college and married a few years later. They saw each other only occasionally during the holidays when they’d meet up visiting the folks before they were both gone. He had visited Patrick and his family a few times over the years, but never felt welcome despite his sister in law’s efforts.
“What the fuck! What the fucking fuck!” He upended the bottle and took another long drink. “Patrick can go to hell!” He grumbled and kicked his shoes off.
“Patrick and Yana both can just go to hell!” Another swallow and Sean mumbled, “But why does it feel like I’m the one in hell?”
He didn’t move from the couch until his bladder protested, sometime after dawn. He didn’t need the candle anymore and pinched it out with thumb and forefinger; surprised a little by the prick of pain. He didn’t think he could feel anything anymore. He opened the next bottle and drank.
“I thought he loved me! He said he loved me!” Sean wiped the wetness from his face with his forearm. “He must have called Jimmy and told him where we were staying. He might have been seeing Jimmy all along. I wonder if he tells Jimmy he loves him, too?” He heaved the empty bottle across the room and it smashed against the stone fireplace showering the hearth with glass.
He cursed as he struggled to open another bottle.
First, Patrick turned on Sean, didn’t want him around the family; especially his sons—then Yana, his beautiful, green-eyed lover—the only man Sean had ever really loved, totally and without reservation. To find out his love wasn’t reciprocated to the same degree sucked. Sean had believed their relationship exclusive. Apparently, he’d been wrong. He took another long swallow.
He’d have to leave HOME and move back down below. He hated the thought. He’d really grown to love HOME. He loved the idea of it, loved all it stood for, loved being part of an organization fighting for peace everywhere. He’d made many friends up there and the thought of never seeing any of them again brought even more sadness.
Maybe he’d talk to Captain Miller and try and get his old job back. Things would go back to what they were like a year ago. He’d have to find some place to live since he’d just sold his condo. He hadn’t been at all sad to let it go. There were too many memories of lonely nights pacing the floor. Now he would have that all back again.
“Oh, Yana! How could you do this to me? You were everything to me. What was I to you? Just a passing fancy? How many others were there?” Sean wallowed in his misery.
Two days later, Sean stumbled around in the kitchen, pulling everything out of the cabinets looking for another bottle. He didn’t hear the car pull up out front. He ignored the banging on the door and continued his hunt. He vaguely heard a voice calling his name, but paid no attention to it.
There had to be a bottle of something to drink somewhere. Someone must have hidden it. Probably that little whore, Yana. He must have stashed it. Or maybe he gave it to one of his other fuck buddies.
“Sean, are you okay?” Aaron asked.
“Can’t find it,” Sean stumbled to another cabinet and began throwing things out of the way in his search.
“What? What are you looking for?” Aaron asked.
“My bottle. The little whore must a hid it. Gotta find it,” he slurred.
Glancing around the place, Aaron sighed, thinking it looked worse than his old apartment used to look. He flipped a light switch but it didn’t come on. He went out back in search of the generator, found it in the shed and turned it on. He came back inside to see Sean still rummaging through the cabinets.
Aaron turned the lights on and went in search of the coffee pot. He found it and set to making some. A further search around the small but modernized three-room cabin and he found the thermostat and clicked the heater on to help chase the early morning chill.
“I talked with Yana.” Sean completely ignored Aaron, still searching. “He’s very upset you walked out on him. Whatever Jimmy said was a lie. You should know that.”
“He let Jimmy fuck him. And probably anybody else who wanted to. Where the hell is that bottle! You got anything to drink in your car?” Sean finally turned around and looked at him.
Sean’s appearance shocked Aar
on, a three day growth of beard, bleary red-rimmed eyes, and a desperate look of sadness Aaron had never seen in Sean before.
“Coffee’s almost ready. Why don’t we open some of these cans and have some lunch?”
“Don’t want coffee, don’t want to eat. I need a drink,” Sean insisted.
Aaron jolted awake in his chair twenty-four extremely difficult hours later to find Sean sitting on the couch, leaning forward with elbows on knees and his face buried in his hands sobbing quietly. Aaron made his way into the bathroom, relieved himself then went into the kitchen and started another pot of coffee. By the time he had it ready, Sean had composed himself and sat staring straight ahead at the empty fireplace. Aaron managed to get Sean to drink some coffee and eat a few bites of stew he’d heated up. Very slowly, the booze started to wear off and Sean began to regain his senses.
Aaron struggled to drag every little bit of conversation out of Sean but by the end of the day, the entire story was out. Sean explained how Jimmy had alluded to just having sex with Yana and when he came into the room and found Yana naked and in bed; he believed him.
“Yana is devastated you walked out on him, Sean.
How could you believe anything Jimmy said? Why didn’t you give Yana the benefit of the doubt?”
“Because I didn’t have any doubt once I saw Yana in bed naked. He must have called Jimmy and arranged to meet with him while I was in my meeting. There’s no other way he could have known we’d be at that hotel.”
“It wasn’t exactly a secret that the two of you were going to L.A., Sean. Anyone could have told Jimmy that.
Remember he was born and raised on HOME. He’s still got friends and a couple of cousins up there.”
“Do you know that for sure?” Sean asked.
“What I know for sure is that Yana loves you, that he’d never cheat on you, and that he’s heartbroken that you think that he did.”
“Oh my God!” Sean moaned.
“You need to get yourself cleaned up, shaved and some food in you. I’ll fix us something to eat while you clean up.”
“Nothing personal, Aaron, but your cooking stinks.”
Sean stretched and everything cracked.
“You don’t exactly have a lot to choose from here.
I’ll open some cans of stew. That’s usually pretty good. I don’t think I can mess that up,” Aaron offered.
“I don’t want any stew.”
“Hit the shower, Sean. I’ll heat up the stew,” Aaron insisted.
“All of a sudden you’re in charge of my life now?”
Sean asked with just a touch of belligerence.
“Yeah, right now, I am. You stink and you look like shit. Go. Scrape some whiskers and for God’s sake, take a shower!” Aaron headed for the kitchen.
A short time later, Sean came out of the bathroom, head down, and took a seat at the table across from Aaron who sat silently sipping a cup of coffee.
“Did you happen to come across any Tylenol?”
Sean asked as he put the spoon into the bowl and began to eat.
“I saw some around here somewhere.” Aaron pulled the container out of a cabinet and handed it to him.
Sean dumped three out into his shaking hand and swallowed them with a gulp of coffee. “Thanks,” he muttered and went back to his stew.
“Yana’s never going to forgive me,” he said in a very tired voice as he rinsed his bowl in the sink.
“You’ve got your job cut out for you, that’s for sure.
But the Sean Riker I know would never back off from a job just because it’s the size of a mountain,” Aaron tried to sympathize.
“I don’t know what happened. I really believed…”
He couldn’t finish the terrible thought; sickened he’d ever considered something Jimmy said as true.
“He didn’t. He wouldn’t. Yana loves you, Sean. He would never cheat on you. Never!”
“I know that. I do know. It’s just… Jimmy standing there with a shit-eating grin on his face…”
“You know Jimmy. You know he’s a trouble maker.
How could you have possibly believed him?” Aaron asked.
“I don’t know. I just don’t know. Maybe it’s my own insecurities. Maybe it’s the age thing. I’m fifteen years older than Jimmy. He has a history with Yana.”
“One drunken weekend, years ago. Yana despises him now,” Aaron said.
“And I’ve blown everything to hell. I know that now. What’s left? Nothing.” Sean leaned back against the cabinet staring off into space in despair.
“You don’t even want to try?”
“What’s the use? He’ll never forgive me.” Sean felt more cold and alone than he had ever been in his life. He gave a little involuntary shudder.
“Yana’s mad as hell and he has every right to be.
But he loves you. Give it a little time and it’ll work itself out.”
“You think I should go to him and explain?” Sean asked with a glimmer of hope.
“I think you should go home,” Aaron said.
“I can’t. He’ll be there. He probably hates me now.”
Sean shuffled his feet and stuck both hands in his pockets.
“Then just go stay in your old room across the hall.
Stay there for a while until you get things sorted out.”
Aaron offered.
“Sorted out. There’s no sorting to do. I’m out,” Sean said.
“Maybe. Maybe not. You’ll never know if you sit around here and drink yourself to death.”
” I need a drink!” Sean said, holding his head in his hands.
“You need to go home,” Aaron persisted.
“I could get a drink there. They know me. They wouldn’t refuse.” The thought of returning to HOME
warmed him somewhat.
He had friends there. People who liked and cared about him, and wouldn’t throw him out of their lives just because he made one mistake.
“Go home!”
“I need to take my rental car back.” Doubt resurfaced and he began to think of reasons not to go home.
“I’ll take it back. You just go home.”
Sean stared at him a minute while hope warred with despair then transported home.
Aaron sighed deeply and seated himself at the dinner table and tried to relax. He was explaining things to Caroline while she worked wonders with one of her shoulder massages, when his phone rang.
“Aaron, this is Noel. May I have a moment of your time?”
“Yes, of course, Noel. What is it? Is Sean all right?”
“What the hell happened? They said they had plans for dinner with you and Caroline.
Now Yana is sullen and won’t speak to anyone and Sean has taken up residence in his old room again and he won’t speak to anyone either except to order copious amounts of liquor sent to his room.”
“I can tell you what happened in one word— Jimmy!”
“Jimmy? I thought that problem was all taken care of?”
Aaron explained the situation and chain of events leading up to the current state. “It’s all a hell of a mess.”
“Oooohh no!” Noel sighed out, “Well, they’ll have to work it out. Everyone is talking about it and wondering what’s going on. Both of them are acting a little ridiculous.”
“That happens when your heart gets broken.”
“Unfortunately. I’ll give them a few more days and if they don’t work it out, I’ll have to step in.”
“They’re probably going to need it,” Aaron agreed with his own sigh.
CHAPTER FIVE
Three days later…
“Yana, your presence is requested in room 1711
immediately.”
The message shattered the silence in the room.
Yana wanted to protest but decided he’d better go and check it out. It couldn’t be business related—1711 was a residential number and not a conference room. However, since Noel called, he must need Yana for something. He walk
ed immediately to the room and waited, sure Noel would appear momentarily.
He waited patiently for nearly an hour before he began pacing. He decided to use the com link on the desk to contact Noel, but it didn’t activate when he pressed it. He noticed a piece of paper lying on the desk and picked it up.
Three words were printed on it in large letters.
WORK IT OUT.
He had no idea what the message meant, but decided it had nothing to do with him, so he dropped it and resumed his pacing.
“Sean your presence is requested in room 1711
immediately.”
The message startled him. He’d been leaning against the counter in the kitchen area with a bottle of water in his hand. He touched the com link to ask who needed him, but it didn’t work for some reason. He left the room and headed up to 1711. The door opened in front of him and he walked in. Standing in the middle of the bedroom Yana glanced up and stopped—mid pace—saw Sean and slammed the door.
Sean turned to leave and found the exit panel wouldn’t respond to his touch. He tried the com link on the desk with no luck. It didn’t work either. Then he saw the note.
WORK IT OUT.
“Shit!” he hissed then strode over to the couch and sat down. How could he work things out when he couldn’t even face Yana?
Hours Later
The stress of the last few days had exhausted Sean.
Walking back and forth, blaming himself for being trapped in the same place, but separated from Yana, added to it.
Sean heard movement on the other side and wondered if Yana paced with frustration, too. On a physical level, only a door stood between them, but stubbornness kept Sean from opening it.
Sean finally had enough and went through the door first. He needed to use the bathroom. He tried the knob, found it unlocked, and walked right past a stunned Yana.
Sean didn’t acknowledge the interruption, he had to go and Yana would have to get over it. When Sean came out, Yana stood in the kitchen area, fixing himself something to eat. He carried his food back into the bedroom and closed the door.
The next two days passed the same way. Not a word spoken between them, or eye contact made. Whenever Sean needed to, he walked in, ignored Yana, and used the bathroom. When Yana got hungry, he simply came out, entered the kitchen area, and fixed himself something to eat.
The Missions Page 4