by Lynda Aicher
He bounded up the short flight of stairs to the small stoop, familiarity settling in. He’d been here before, but it’d been a long while since his last visit.
Obviously, too long.
He’d tried to prepare himself for what he’d find behind this door. Tried and failed. The complete lack of information from this source—the direct source—had chilled him more than the updates from Rig and Axel.
The door swung open before he was ready, the slow sweep tensing his muscles until they coiled in his abdomen. The revealed man was a thinned-down version of the brother he knew and loved. Hardened, too. A thick wall of distrust and defiance separated them, unseen but tangible in his closed expression and stiff hold.
Tanner didn’t speak, couldn’t around the hundred different thoughts congealing in a hardened knot in his throat. This move wasn’t his to make. Too much had changed. His coming here now—nine months too late—was the only thing he could do.
“You’re here.”
The gruff statement eased a coating of doubt from the layers that’d stacked up in the last day. Finn Kelley had morphed into another version of himself that Tanner both recognized and didn’t. But this tone, the seemingly flat statement that held more emotion than any buoyant welcome could have, was very Finn.
Tanner nodded. “I am.”
He set his bag down and caught Finn in a hug in the next second. Fuck. He closed his eyes, absorbed the contact and connection he’d schooled himself to forget while deployed. He had dozens of military brothers, men he still worked with. But this bond was deeper, longer, and more solid than any he’d forged before or after.
Finn’s hold was tight, stronger than he’d expected. The intensity soaked through the cold that’d surrounded him for eighteen months. His frame was smaller, his bulk the thinnest he’d ever held. The differences flashed through Tanner’s mind in snippets that registered and fled. More bones than flesh, weight braced heavier on his right side.
Right behind them were the familiar notes that rang through the physical damage. He nuzzled his neck and inhaled, reveling in the soap and man scent that was all Finn. The smooth brush of his shaved cheek, the regulation haircut that bristled against his temple.
His heart swelled, ached with the loss and regrets he couldn’t voice. But over it all was relief. That Finn was alive. That he was here to hold at all.
That Tanner could be here now, even if he couldn’t stay.
—
Finn clung to Tanner with relief and desperation he hadn’t allowed himself to acknowledge through the long months of his recovery. He’d refused to think of what Tanner’s extended absence could mean. Rejected any thought that’d lead to the dark possibilities that came with every military mission. He’d lived that life for fifteen years and understood the dangers as only a special ops brother could.
And yet he’d feared the worst.
Finding out Chris had died in the rafting accident that’d landed him in a coma for seven weeks and almost claimed his own life had devastated him. But he hadn’t allowed himself to focus on how badly the loss hurt. On the hole that still gaped in his heart at the death of his brother to his right.
Tanner, the brother to his left, was back, and he couldn’t process anything except the profound thankfulness for this gift right here. The touch and connection. The unspoken understanding that flowed between them on a level so deep it now sunk into him to quiet the craggy whispers of doubt and doom.
He simply held on and took the comfort that was being given from the only man he could take it from without shattering completely.
Hints of vanilla muddled by the damp flooded past his blocked receptors to fill him with a warmth he’d given up ever feeling again. This deep flash of love and belonging had been dulled for so long, the rush threatened to knock his shaking legs out from beneath him.
Eleven years of friendship forged under situations most couldn’t comprehend, let alone survive, created a level of intimacy no absence could break.
He tightened his hold, pressed his lips to Tanner’s smooth jaw. His heart stuttered, clenched, and finally relaxed to allow air into his lungs. He sucked in a deep breath, gripped Tanner’s nape, and rested his temple against Tanner’s.
He swallowed twice before he could speak, and then his voice was barely above a croak. “How long?”
“Five weeks.”
Warm breath ghosted over his cheek with each word. He suppressed a shudder and collected himself, stretching the unspoken promise over the hole in his heart in a miserable excuse of a patch.
Five weeks. Forever on military time, and barely a blink on civilian.
The annoying drizzle of rain peppering his face and arms finally penetrated through the tunnel focus he’d fallen into the second he spotted Tanner approaching his home. He gave himself another moment to relish the bond he couldn’t explain and had feared was completely severed after Chris died.
Another deep breath, a brush of lips on his cheek, and he let go. He took a cautious step back, smothered his wince when his knee almost buckled. Newly learned habits and tricks kept his legs beneath him and his dignity intact as he held the door open for Tanner.
Damn he looked good.
A Marine to his core, Tanner Dorsey emanated the confidence and poise that came from his years in the Corps and the prejudices he still battled. Finn had always viewed Tanner as a mix of the best of both his parents. His diluted Korean heritage from his mother clung to his distinctive almond eyes and thick black hair. His father’s Caucasian assets of an oblong face and a good height and build provided the muscular form that drew many eyes, both male and female.
Rain clung to his short hair and slicked his leather coat in a wet gloss. His jeans hugged his narrow hips and molded around his ass, sculpted by hours of rigorous training, and now flexing with each step he took.
Finn shut the door and Tanner hung his coat in the entry closet. His familiar ease within Finn’s home loosened yet another of the harbored concerns that’d manage to fester beneath the layers of worries.
His shoulders were back, stance as straight as he could get it, when Tanner turned to him. Seven months of rehabilitation therapy had gotten him to this point, but he was still far from the man he’d been before the head injury and coma had stolen his entire sense of self.
So much passed between them through eye contact alone, thoughts flying and answered with nothing more than a slight raise of the brow and compression of lips. Are you okay? Do you miss him? Are you ready for what’s next?
The dim hallway didn’t hide anything. An arm’s length away and miles from where’d they’d once been, he ached to fall into Tanner’s strength, when he’d always stood on his own.
But he flat-out refused to be that weak.
“Have you talked to Rig?” Finn asked, his voice too loud in the hushed space of his small foyer.
“No.” Tanner wet his lips, shoved his hands into his pockets. “I got back at twenty-two hundred hours yesterday and spent the next six in debrief.” He stepped closer, hurt and sorrow clouding his deep brown, almost black eyes. “I came here the second I was free.”
Finn could only nod, his throat too tight to speak. The unasked question of why he hadn’t contacted Tanner himself was another of the many questions left unspoken. Another round of hurt spread over Tanner’s frown, his brows pulling together before they flattened out on a deep inhalation.
The urge to yank his gaze or duck his head crawled up Finn’s nape and threatened to humiliate him even more. His physical weakness had nothing on the emotional vulnerability he battled daily. It was foreign and so damn annoying, and he fought the elusive fucker from sunup to sundown and then armored up before going to sleep with the hopes that he’d wake in one piece.
If he could let anyone see that, it would be Tanner. His soul mate in every way except sexually, he’d understand. No, his fear of exposing the raging beast of insecurity was based solely on his own belief that once he set it loose, he’d never be whole again.
Tanner raised his hand, the movement cautious—or was it deliberate? He cupped Finn’s neck, thumb stroking over the edge of his jaw. The touch seared Finn’s heart and almost shattered the core of determined strength he’d been sucking from his entire life. He gasped, turned his chin into the caress.
“I’ve missed you, you fucker,” Tanner murmured.
The tenderness wrapped around him in a harsh reminder of how isolated his existence had become. A lifetime of holding everything in and everyone at bay had kept him sane when he should’ve gone crazy. Tanner and Chris had been the only ones he’d ever allowed in.
The only ones who’d ever breached his barriers when he’d been positive no one ever would. Nine days trapped behind enemy lines with them, fighting their way through hell, scared out of their fucking minds the entire time, witnessing and performing acts they’d signed up for and somehow never believed they’d do, had seared them both into his heart.
Finn cleared his throat and fought back the burn scorching his sinuses. He stepped away, too weak to take more of what Tanner offered.
“I’ll call Rig,” Finn said, heading down the hall to the kitchen, working to keep his gait fluid. The next task would suck more than any of the physical therapy he’d been through in the last months—and that’d been more debilitating and horrible than anything he’d experienced in the service.
He grabbed his cellphone from the counter, found Rig’s number, and pressed Call without looking at Tanner. He sensed him, though, his presence crowding the room he’d never thought of as cramped until now.
“It’s about fucking time you called,” Rig stated when he answered. Finn winced, his stomach flipping. He deserved that, but he refused to feel guilty. He’d basically isolated himself in his home since he’d been freed from the rehab center in November. Seeing the vital, healthy Marines who populated the adventure company he’d founded with Chris only emphasized his own broken state.
“Do you have any damn clue how selfish your goddamn actions have been?” Rig went on. “Are you done being an asshole?”
He understood how he’d hurt those who’d wanted to help him. What they didn’t understand was his inability to accept their help, how ashamed he’d been over his disabilities, and still was. He’d spent thirty-eight years building up and maintaining his physical strength, honing every muscle to respond quickly and on reflex to any threat, only to wake up one day unable to feed himself, let alone talk or piss.
The pause lengthened on the phone, words flowing in and out of his mind before he could speak. In the end, he said only what was needed. “Tanner’s here.”
“Shit.” Rig’s breathy response held the note of understanding edged with pain that’d probably been in his own tone as well. “Three hours?”
Finn glanced at the clock and calculated the needed prep. “Sure.”
“I’m on it.” Rig cleared his throat, the low rumble barely reaching him through the connection. “We’ll meet you there.”
He hung up, the silence settling around him to magnify the awareness prickling over his neck and grinding into his skull. His hands started to tremble, the motion so slight most wouldn’t notice. He did, though. Every quirk and hitch was amplified into a glaring blast of his current failings.
He was working on it. Getting better each day.
But would he ever get back to his former self?
He turned around, braced his fists on the counter. His thoughts rambled in a jumbled glob that he tried to sort through for the most relevant thread. Tanner’s frown deepened the longer he remained silent. He should speak, say something. But the words weren’t there.
Poof, they’d all evaporated in the blink of time it’d taken him to assess the lingering fallout of his head injury and subsequent coma.
“Three hours then?” Tanner asked.
There it was. Finn yanked ahold of the line and reeled it in until he found the connection to his voice. “Yes.”
“How long will the drive take?”
“Fifteen, twenty minutes.”
“Do we need to get anything? Call anyone else?”
“No. Rig’s handling it.”
Tanner moved around the peninsula bar, placed his hand over one of Finn’s clenched fists. He dipped until he caught Finn’s gaze. His voice was firm when he spoke, conviction pure and strong. “We’ll get through this.”
They would. But how?
He’d been trying to figure that out for seven long months and was still as lost regarding the answer as he’d been when he’d first learned how drastically everything had changed.
“We should get ready,” he said, siphoning strength from the simple fact that no explanation had been needed between them. Between any of his fellow military brothers. He’d been waiting for Tanner to execute what his therapists said he should’ve done months ago.
They hadn’t understood his refusal, but the Kick team had. They were ready now, and with Tanner here, he was too.
Love stories you’ll never forget
By authors you’ll always remember
eOriginal Romance from Random House
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