Bad Judgment

by Sidney Bell

  “Then make me forget,” Embry said.

  And Brogan did.

  With long kisses and strong hands and whispers of love, he made everything else fade away until it was just the two of them. They were hidden here in the dark room and the cool sheets, safe and together and Embry could be here for this, wouldn’t miss this for anything. He cringed away once, against his will, when Brogan slid his fingers inside, but even as Brogan pulled back, frowning and asking if he was all right, Embry remembered that he’d made Joel use a condom, that there was no sign of him left in Embry’s body, nothing to sully Brogan.

  “Keep going,” he said.

  When he was soft and open, he pushed Brogan onto his back and straddled him, using one hand to direct Brogan’s cock so that he could sink down. When he started to move, he concentrated hard to memorize the moment: the stretch and burn, the fullness and friction, Brogan’s deep, rough groans, his clutching grip, all of it proof that Brogan cared enough to be here with him, loved him enough to stay.

  Chapter Twenty

  Embry often dreamed that he was at the bottom of the ocean. The frigid water was blue-black, the pressure immense, bearing down from every direction so that his insides seemed on the verge of implosion.

  He tried to swim to the surface, but he couldn’t be sure which way was up. It wasn’t long before his limbs started to feel heavy. He began thinking about how nice it would be to just rest, just let the water take him. The strain on his lungs increased. He fought harder, cutting through the current, but no matter what he did, the sea kept him.

  Sometimes he could feel the brush of fins against his skin. Sometimes he was alone. Sometimes he could see the surface, miles above his head, a lighter blue, as far away as the moon. Sometimes he was blind.

  But it always ended the same. Exhausted from the long swim to nowhere, he took a breath of cold ocean and died.

  It didn’t take a genius to pick apart the subtext, but then, Embry was a literal sort of guy.

  * * *

  A hand on his shoulder brought him out of sleep and he struck without looking. His fist nearly caught Brogan in the mouth—only Brogan’s quick reaction saved him, and then Embry was naked in bed, sheets around his waist, hair tousled and in his eyes. Brogan was kneeling beside him wearing a gray suit, smelling of soap and toothpaste.

  “Trying to tell me something?” Brogan asked mildly.

  “No,” Embry said, willing his heart to slow. “Sorry.”

  Brogan shifted to sit on the edge of the bed. “I’ve been there. Don’t worry about it.” He flattened his tie—red with little gold stripes. Didn’t go with the suit, Embry noted, surprised by how endearing he found it. “First week or so after I came back from Iraq, I was sleeping on Sheila’s couch until I found a place. She came to wake me up once and I almost took her head off before I realized it was her. Could happen when I was awake, too, back then. Someone would move a little too fast or startle me and I’d just...react.”

  “Just a bad dream,” Embry said. He pictured Brogan sleeping on some ratty sofa, angry and vulnerable and without a home of his own, and Embry had to lean against Brogan’s arm to remember the solidity of him. “Haven’t fought a war lately.”

  “There are different kinds of wars,” Brogan said, shrugging. “The sensation of breaking doesn’t change.”

  Embry touched Brogan’s mouth with two fingers—that mouth that smiled so easily. Another sign of Brogan’s strength. “You don’t act broken.”

  “I’m not anymore,” Brogan replied, apparently unoffended. “There are things I have trouble dealing with, even now, and there are times when it’s still hard—really hard. But given enough time and effort, there’s almost nothing that can’t be made better, Embry. The first step is to stop doing shit that puts you in a position to break down—you can’t heal if you keep reopening the wound.”

  Miraculously, the words seemed nonjudgmental. Embry pulled his hand back anyway.

  “Have you ever talked to anyone about it?” Brogan asked. “Helen, maybe?”

  “What’s there to say?” Embry had slept for hours but he felt exhausted. His eyes were gritty. “They’re gone. They’re not coming back. It’s... It’s just me left.” He meant to leave it there, but then he blurted, “I didn’t even cry until that day with you.”

  “Baby,” Brogan murmured. He kissed Embry’s temple.

  “Sometimes I almost think I could talk to you,” Embry admitted, and then, as if to punish him for his daring, his mouth clamped shut. Still, it was more than he’d had with anyone since Amy. He hadn’t even talked to his parents as easily as he could talk to Brogan, he realized.

  Which wasn’t saying much, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t a shock all the same.

  “Progress,” Brogan replied, smiling that same crooked smile.

  “You deserve more.”

  Brogan seemed to want to address that, but he glanced at his bedside clock with a small grimace—it was almost five—and let it go instead. He ran a warm hand along Embry’s arm. The touch was far more soothing than it had any right to be.

  “I have to leave for work,” Brogan said. “Early shift. I’ve left, uh, a key for you on the dining room table so you can lock up when you leave. You can give it back tonight if you want to, but you’re welcome to keep it.”

  Embry nodded, not looking at him. He didn’t have the first clue what the proper protocol was. He was pretty sure it was too early to do the whole “exchanging keys” thing—who in their right mind would give Embry a key?—but he already knew he wasn’t going to give it back.

  Brogan kissed him on the forehead. “I’ve got to go. I love you.”

  Embry reached up with one hand to catch Brogan before he could pull away. He pressed their mouths together, perhaps a little fitfully, and then he scrambled up, slinging his leg across Brogan’s thighs to straddle him. He shoved his face into the joint of shoulder and throat, inhaling that uniquely masculine scent that was pure Brogan. Those strong arms came up to hold him, and he sighed, relaxing and curving around the warmth of that big body like a cat. Maybe he couldn’t say it—he didn’t love Brogan, he didn’t—but he was addicted to Brogan’s kindness, nonetheless.

  “Will you come back here after work?” Brogan asked.

  Embry nodded. His morning beard must be scratchy—it made Brogan shiver. Between that and almost punching him, Embry was a walking assault today. “I’m sorry,” he said again.

  “You didn’t even make contact,” Brogan reminded him.

  “Not for that.” Sorry I let him touch me, he meant. Sorry I made you hurt.

  “Ah.” Judging from his tone, Brogan had once again read Embry’s silence expertly. “Well, we’ll fix it so that doesn’t happen again, hmm?”

  “No one in their right mind would put up with this shit.”

  Brogan pushed Embry back a bit so he could make eye contact. “You’re worth it, Embry. You are.”

  Then they were kissing again, slow and easy at first, then harder and deeper. Embry’s fingers knotted in the fabric of Brogan’s jacket, his knees clenching around Brogan’s hips, as if his body knew to hold on as hard as possible.

  Then Brogan pulled back with a groan of reluctance. “I’m going to be late.”

  “Right.” Embry couldn’t quite make himself release Brogan, and after a second, Brogan peeled him off, his smile pleased and indulgent as he deposited Embry on the mattress. Brogan kissed him once more near the corner of his eye, and then patted him on the hip.

  “You make it difficult to leave,” he said, shaking his head as he got up. He straightened his tie and lingered at the door to leer at Embry where he was sprawled naked and half-hard on the bed. “Jesus. I’m going to have an aneurysm.”

  Embry listened to him make his way through the house, saying good-bye to Gizmo—with a hushed promis
e of cookies if the dog could make Embry want to come back, something Embry was certain he wasn’t supposed to hear—before he called out a last good-bye and left.

  The heater kicked on, disturbing the quiet, and Gizmo wandered in, eyeing Embry as if considering the repercussions of jumping on the bed. He seemed to think better of it and slumped onto the rug instead.

  “Good boy,” Embry said, and the dog’s long tail swept across the floor with a thwap at the praise.

  He didn’t think so much as marvel. After yesterday, after letting Joel...he wasn’t sure how he’d expected Brogan to react, but he’d never thought to receive such profound compassion. Embry replayed the sex from the night before, and conceded that Brogan did, indeed, love him.

  Part of him was desperately grateful.

  The other part knew it would only get Brogan hurt.

  He could admit to himself, here in this quiet bedroom, that if it wasn’t for the circumstances, he’d stay here with Brogan for as long as Brogan would have him. It wasn’t love, not really, but it could be. Brogan deserved to be loved with all the fierce devotion Embry possessed, but he couldn’t let himself.

  His loyalty to Amy came first. She came first.

  * * *

  Around eleven, Embry and Joel walked through the atrium, arguing about—of all the stupid things—the number of times Joel could expect Embry to pick up his dry cleaning each week. Joel seemed to think he was being flirtatious. Embry thought it was beyond crass for bosses to ask for things like that, but he kept his tone light to avoid a fight.

  Brogan followed them while Mario, the current primary escort, walked a few feet in front. Embry approved of Mario—he hadn’t been able to find anything in the bodyguard’s background to suggest he could be bribed or blackmailed, and he’d been smart enough to choose Brogan for a friend. Footsteps and voices echoed in the atrium, rebounding off the tile and marble. The lunchtime bustle wouldn’t start for a while, and there were only a dozen or so people there.

  Joel’s phone rang. He slowed to read the caller’s name and Mario hung back with him while Embry walked on alone, eager for a few seconds of silence.

  He stepped outside, surveying the area out of habit. The front walk was lined with benches and winter-empty cement planters, and meandered down to the drop-off loop where the SUV was waiting to take them to the restaurant. To the left was the cobblestone path that led around the main building and back toward the administration parking lot, and to the right was the path that led to the golf cart station, where staff could get a ride to any of the other buildings on campus, some of which were far away, like the warehouses.

  He was wandering toward the car when he saw Vindler, recognizable by that vampiric widow’s peak and his manic, white-faced fury. And because Embry alone knew the specific details of the envelope he’d handed to Vindler that day in his office, he instantly knew what was happening.

  Vindler never, ever would’ve risked that secret getting out, so if he was here, it meant that Grailer & McNeil had decided to push forward on the deal with the cartel despite Vindler’s arguments. He wouldn’t trust Embry or Joel to care that he’d tried to stop them, and apparently preferred arrest or death over exposure.

  Everything slowed down.

  He even had time to wonder if he was about to die.

  His eye caught on the shotgun Vindler was trying to lift—the barrel had caught on the seam of his trench coat, and he stopped to look down in confusion, tugging at it. Embry had a split second to think Brogan and then he shouted, “Gun!”

  A flurry of movement erupted at the glass doors: Mario hustling Joel away, people scattering. Embry wasn’t carrying a weapon, and he was too far away to disarm Vindler before he could get shot. He’d never get inside in time, and the entire south wall was glass anyway.

  Vindler managed to free the shotgun from the fabric of his coat.

  Embry dropped to the ground, making himself into the smallest target possible, covering his head with his arms. He heard three gunshots in rapid succession, the last deeper in pitch than the first two, and then silence. He wondered if it was done and lifted his head to look.

  “Stay down,” a familiar voice barked. Brogan.

  People were yelling and shoe leather scraped on gravel as Brogan walked away, talking to someone on his radio. Everything sounded distant—Embry’s eardrums were still ringing. He twisted, straining to get a glimpse of what was going on without putting his brain at risk. Brogan was standing over a fallen figure on the ground while Wiley, the bodyguard who’d been waiting at the car, approached with his pistol out as well.

  Brogan kicked the shotgun away, said something to Wiley, and bent to check Vindler’s pulse. A second later, his shoulders sagged and he backed a few steps away to lean against the brick facade of the building.

  So Vindler was dead then. Embry glanced around as he sat up, but he doubted Vindler had enlisted anyone else to help him. He wouldn’t have been willing to share his secret shame even in the interest of obtaining aid for murder.

  Touring security guards were running from every direction, and the other Security Division people were there now, too. Altogether it’d been less than a minute, so the response time was pretty impressive. Embry felt a little vague. Shock, probably. For all of his preparations, he’d never been shot at before, and it was a rather disorienting experience. There was gravel embedded in the palms of his hands and the knee of his trousers was torn from when he’d thrown himself to the ground.

  But his gaze returned to Brogan, who stared at Vindler’s body, pistol still in his hand, which was dripping blood.

  Embry was up before he thought about it, hurrying to Brogan’s side. He guided Brogan’s hand into holstering his pistol, then tugged Brogan’s jacket off his arms to examine the shredded fabric of his shirt.

  Fuck. Fuck.

  Not again. He couldn’t—

  “It’s just a few pellets in my forearm,” Brogan said. “The shotgun went off when I shot him, and I caught some ricochets off the ground. I’m fine.”

  “You need an ambulance,” Embry said. His hands hovered uselessly in the air—the shirt was too wrecked to function as a bandage to stop the bleeding, but he couldn’t just stand here, could he? He stared at the growing stain and tried to corral his panic. It wasn’t the same as before, he told himself. Brogan would be fine—if there was such a thing as a good way to be shot, a few shotgun pellets in the forearm was it. Brogan would be fine.

  “One’s on the way,” Wiley said, startling Embry into remembering his presence. The skinny man stood beside the discarded shotgun, and he raised a hand to his earpiece as if having trouble hearing whoever spoke on the other end. Embry could relate—there were sirens in the distance, but they sounded foggy through the buzz in his ears. The sound made his skin crawl anyway. He had to take a deep breath through his mouth—it wouldn’t help to catch the scent of the blood—to keep himself calm. His mind wanted to replay the moment in the basement, the last time he’d smelled blood with sirens in the air, and he had to work hard to stay in the here and now.

  It’d been so close, he thought, staring at the droplets on Brogan’s broad hand. He’d almost lost everything all over again.

  Then the redhead was there with a first-aid kit. Embry didn’t remember the woman’s name, but she nodded to him. She took Brogan’s good arm, jerking her chin in the direction of one of the nearby benches.

  “Let’s go sit down,” she said.

  “I’m going to need to talk to someone about this,” Brogan said.

  “You can talk to the cops when you’re not bleeding all over me,” she pointed out. Embry liked her already, despite the hyperbole. She seemed steady, capable of taking care of Brogan when Embry couldn’t.

  “I’m fine, Nora,” Brogan said. “Really.”

  “Yeah, I was just gonna say this looks like your best day
ever,” Nora said, voice heavy with exasperation. “Would you sit down?”

  “I have to talk to the cops,” he replied stubbornly. Embry didn’t like the pinched twist of his mouth. This wasn’t about the cops, who were generally smart enough to find someone sitting ten feet away. “I have to explain.”

  “Sit down until they get here,” she said more softly, frowning.

  Embry looked down, at the body of the man Brogan had killed, and it occurred to him that this wasn’t the first time Brogan had taken a life. He was a soldier—in mind and body if not in profession any longer—with a history of PTSD. He’d gone on autopilot, falling back on his training, and his training probably said that he didn’t leave the site of a shooting until he was cleared. Brogan’s default setting in times of crisis was to follow orders.

  “I’m all right,” Brogan insisted. “Really.”

  Blood made a neat little puddle on the concrete by his shoe and Embry decided it was time for new orders.

  “Sit the fuck down, Smith,” Embry said, his voice as hard and uncompromising as he could make it. “Now.”

  Brogan’s brow creased. He lurched almost compulsively in the direction of the bench before catching himself. He blinked at Embry while he put it together, and then an expression of profound weariness crossed his face. He looked old suddenly, and haggard, as if by pulling the trigger he’d killed a part of himself along with Vindler. It made Embry brush his fingers against the back of Brogan’s hand. Not smart, not remotely smart, not here in front of all these people, but he couldn’t help it.

  Embry never wanted to see that look on Brogan’s face again. “Sit down now.”

  “Right,” Brogan muttered. “Right.”

  He let Nora lead him away, and even though everything in him wanted to follow, Embry hung back to pick up Brogan’s suit jacket. As he straightened, he saw Coop standing behind the glass wall of the admin building, not fifteen feet away, watching him, a small smirk playing on his lips. His gaze lingered on the jacket in Embry’s hand, then flitted over Embry’s shoulder to Brogan before returning to make eye contact.