Beyond Jealousy

by Kit Rocha

  Chapter Nineteen

  The day after the explosion--and Mad's subsequent nightmare--was arduously long. Rachel slogged her way through it, yearning for a cold beer, a soft bed, and some comfort from her two favorite men.

  Only Cruz was in his room when she came in after her shift pouring drinks at the Broken Circle. She kicked off her shoes, crawled onto the couch next to him, and curled up against his side. "This day sucks."

  "Yeah, it does." He slipped an arm around her, tugging her closer as his lips brushed the top of her head. "But Mad's doing okay. He came to Dallas's meeting to hear what Noah had to say."

  "How'd it go with Fleming?"

  "I'd say he heard Dallas's declaration of war loud and clear." Cruz snorted. "Noah thinks quick on his feet. He convinced Fleming that he'd rigged one of the blasts to go early to try to take out Dallas."

  It was audacious--and just crazy enough to play well for an egomaniac like Fleming. "Noah's got a set of brass ones, doesn't he?"

  "Without a doubt. He gave your father some equipment to help him track down Skinny Pete. A few more days, and we should have the whole organization wiped out." He squeezed her shoulder. "Your life can go back to normal."

  His touch kindled a peaceful warmth that had her leaning in closer, her lips curving up into a smile. "I could do without the danger and violence, but I kind of like our new normal."

  "Me, too," he said, leaning in.

  His lips had almost reached hers when an abrupt knock pulled them apart. Ace was already coming through the door, his usual easy smile looking fixed. "Hope I'm not interrupting."

  Rachel shifted on the couch, drawing her legs up to make room for him. "We were waiting for you."

  But Ace swung a chair out from the table instead, spinning it around so he could straddle it. "Good. Because I've been thinking..."

  Mild words, innocuous, but Cruz went rigid next to her. "About what?"

  "About this." He waved a finger, taking in the three of them.

  If it weren't for Cruz's sudden tension, Rachel could have told herself this was a good thing. Talking, maybe even about cementing their relationship into something deeper. But in so many ways, it felt like Cruz knew Ace better than she did.

  This was wrong, all wrong.

  Ace was cool, relaxed. She'd seen him like this a hundred times, his legs casually sprawled, his tattooed arms folded across the back of a chair. He looked like he was getting ready to share a funny story, not rip their world apart.

  But that was exactly what he did. "I was just thinking, it's been really good. And maybe we should go out on a high note instead of riding it into the ground."

  The words echoed in her head, like the garbled sound of rain hitting a tin roof combined with the low murmur of voices in a faraway room. No matter how much her brain tried to make sense of it all, turn it into something intelligible, she kept coming around to the fact that he couldn't have said what she thought he said.

  And yet she knew he had.

  "Go out," she repeated flatly.

  Cruz tightened his hand on her hip. "What are you doing, Ace?"

  "I'm being responsible. Thinking about the bigger picture." He met Rachel's eyes. "Do you really want to keep going until you hate me again?"

  "This time is different." She heard her own words like they were coming from that far-off room, not her own damn mouth. "I don't understand."

  "Cruz does," Ace said without releasing her gaze. "He knows about divided loyalties."

  Cruz sat beside her, still as stone except for the fine tremor in his hands, and that tiny concession of control drove her from numb to furious in a heartbeat.

  It would never be enough. No matter how much they opened to him, no matter how much they gave, Ace would always find a way to withdraw. It didn't matter whether it was out of fear or boredom--or if he was telling the truth when he said he didn't know how to love. The end result was the same.

  Agony. Loss. The sharp, driving pain in her chest that couldn't quite drown out the anger, because this time he wasn't just hurting her. He was hurting Cruz, too.

  "No." She climbed off the couch and stood directly in front of Ace's chair. "If this is what you want to do, I can't stop you. But you don't get to blame it on us, because all we've done is try to love you."

  Ace didn't flinch. "I warned you about that, you know. It's only easy to love me in the beginning. This way you won't have to keep trying."

  "That's bullshit. Cowardly, straight-up fucking bullshit, and you know it."

  "Rachel." Cruz slid his arms around her, tugging her back a step, and Ace's gaze finally shifted, skating down her body to lock on the hands spanning her waist.

  A muscle in his jaw jumped, the only indication of tension he'd shown. "We all got what we wanted, right? You got me out of your system, and Cruz figured out how to loosen the hell up. We can all walk away friends, or we can wait until this whole fucking thing crashes and brings half the gang down with it."

  Part of her wanted to scream at him. The rest of her wanted to cry. She had to bite the inside of her cheek to stop the questions, the demands. The pleas.

  Nothing had gone wrong, that was the hardest part to wrap her bruised heart around. Ace was bracing for an impact that hadn't come, maybe never would...but he was bailing out, all the same.

  Her pain left her harsh, bitter. "I remember now. Words don't mean anything until you want them to." Rachel took another step back. "And when you're done, you throw them away like everything else."

  Ace rose and shoved the chair back toward the table. "Keep the collar, brother, until you can find her one that can be from just you. And when you're ready for marks, you know where to find me."

  Cruz's fingers curled into fists. "You think you're that disposable?"

  "Oh, I know I am." He swung toward the door. "You'll thank me later for making it clean."

  Clean. An odd word, out of place, because even if he was okay with how things had turned out, even if he wasn't bleeding inside, shouldn't he have been a little sad? It was a bittersweet ending, at best, but Ace was strolling toward the door as if nothing had happened.

  As if he'd never told her he loved her.

  The clasp on her collar was too small to manipulate quickly, so Rachel yanked at the delicate webbing of chain until it fell away. It felt heavier in her hand than it had around her neck, and heavier still when she flung it at Ace's back.

  He'd already half-turned when it smacked into him, hitting him on the shoulder and sliding toward the floor. One hand came up as if by instinct, catching it against his hip. "It doesn't change anything. We're O'Kanes. I've got your backs."

  "No, you don't," Cruz growled, stepping past Rachel. "The only back you're guarding right now is your own, and if you take another damn step without admitting it to all of us, I'll--"

  "You'll what?" Ace interrupted with a lazy smile. "Drag me into the cage again? Beat me down in front of everyone because I wouldn't keep sucking your dick when you only ever wanted her?"

  "Stop it." Agony squeezed its way up out of Rachel's chest, threatening to close her throat. "Both of you, just stop."

  "He's not going to listen," Cruz said, the words soft and deadly. "He'll poke and push and shove my face in everything that scares me, but when we get to the part that makes him nervous? He'll throw us both away as fast as he can. And if he'd do that, he doesn't deserve you."

  "I think she told you to stop, brother."

  "I think she told you to stay."

  Ace balled up the collar and tossed it onto the bed. It sprawled across Cruz's neatly tucked covers, a tangle of broken memories in black and silver. "Then neither of us deserve her. At least I'm man enough to admit it."

  "Yeah? Well, I'm man enough to try."

  Her sorrow and desolation condensed into helpless, burning tears, and she pressed the heels of her hands to both eyes to hold them at bay. If they kept talking, the pain and anger roiling through the room would take over entirely, and things would happen, things they co
uldn't take back. "Stop it." She dragged in a breath that turned into a sob. "Please."

  "Okay, okay." Cruz's hands slid over her arms, warm but almost tentative. "I'm sorry."

  The door clicked open, and there was the pain, blooming heavy in Ace's voice. "That's right, brother. Don't forget that you're still the hero."

  The door slammed behind him, and Rachel's tears spilled over.

  "I'm sorry," Cruz repeated, still rubbing her arms, still tentative. "This is my fault. I started this. I thought--"

  "No." That was the worst part, the part that killed. The part that left her aching, body and soul.

  Neither of them had fucked up.

  The only thing they hadn't done was push Ace to come closer, to reveal more of himself. If it was anyone's fault, it was hers, a sin of omission. She'd been so scared of pushing him away that she'd accepted all of his easy smiles, his ready deflections, even when she'd glimpsed the darkness lurking beneath.

  So scared of pushing him away, and now he was gone.

  "Rachel?"

  Cruz held out his arms, and she fell into them as another sob wracked her. "It's all right," she murmured as he cradled her against his chest. Stupid, for her to be comforting him while he held her like a child, but it was all she could think to do.

  So she hid her face against his cheek and whispered it again. If she said the words often enough, she could convince herself. Cruz.

  She might even make them true.

  Right when he'd stopped bracing for the end, Cruz slammed into it.

  It hurt. It ached, like something in his body had actually broken on impact. Watching Rachel cry through the night had hurt the worst, but the tangle of emotions went deeper. There was his own pain at Ace's rejection, twisted with the fear that showing too much of it would make Rachel feel worse. And, beneath all of that, guilt--guilt that as soon as he'd lost Ace, some part of him had started counting down the moments until Rachel drifted away, too.

  She didn't deserve his doubts. They came from a dark place, one that wondered if he'd only been a consolation prize all along, if Ace had been his ticket into heaven. Hell, Ace didn't deserve it, either, even if he was an asshole. Ace shouldn't have been a step to Cruz's happy ending, he should have been part of it.

  He would have been. He had been, only Cruz had been too awkward with his own feelings to say so, and now Ace would never believe it. Too little, too late.

  "Hey, you were military, right?"

  Cruz glanced up from the engine parts spread out before him and found Zan giving him a contemplative look. The massive bouncer had dropped by the garage and offered to help Cruz reassemble one of the motorcycles they'd rescued from Three, but this was the first thing the man had actually said to him that didn't involve carburetors or wrenches. "Yeah, pretty much raised military."

  Zan studied him. "You ever train outside Eden?"

  Distraction only worked if you let it, so he wouldn't think about last night. Wouldn't wonder if something in the story of his past had been the final push that had shoved Ace away. "Sometimes."

  "Did you go to a place called Groom Lake? It used to be part of an Air Force installation before the Flares."

  "I've heard of it, but no, I haven't been there. The inter-base command structure fell apart pretty fast after the lights went out."

  Zan took a long drag from his cigarette and spoke through the cloud of smoke drifting from his mouth. "People used to think the government was experimenting on alien aircraft there, you know. Called it Area 51."

  It was almost enough to make Cruz smile. "Are you so sure they didn't? The military has experimented with a lot of things they'd never admit to publicly."

  "Crazier shit has happened, I guess."

  "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

  "Try me sometime." Zan chuckled. "I've seen some wild things out here in the sectors."

  "I bet you have." Cruz rose and circled the bike. "I think we're ready to--"

  The words froze in his throat as Ace pushed through the door.

  That tangle of emotions constricted into a tight ball of anger, anger that burned toward rage as Ace crossed half of the distance between them without giving any indication that things were wrong. He was playing the game for all he was worth, wearing his nothing really matters smile like armor, and all Cruz could think about was Rachel's voice breaking as she fought through her tears to reassure him.

  Maybe Ace had a little survival instinct, though, because he stopped just out of reach. "Hey, Zan."

  "What's up?" Zan laid down his wrench, swiped one grimy hand across his forehead, and glanced at Cruz. "I got a thing. You square?"

  "We're square." Good, he hadn't forgotten how to make his voice nice and empty. Easy, just like Ace. "Thanks for your help."

  Zan ambled out, and Ace tilted his head with a grin. "He's probably off to tell Dallas that you're about to break all of his artist's fingers, so you've got about five minutes, tops."

  "I'm not going to break your fingers." To prove it, he unclenched his fists. "But I am going to ask you a question, and if you don't answer it without the bullshit, I might break your face."

  Ace's smile slipped away, but he couldn't hold his tongue. He could never hold his damn tongue. "So much for the hugs and hand jobs, eh?"

  Cruz crossed the space between them so fast, the passage was a blur even to him. The world shifted to flashes of sensation--the tensing of his muscles, the relief of movement. Of reaction.

  He slammed into Ace's chest, and the impact drove him back against the wall. Ace didn't fight back, only stared at Cruz from two inches away, his eyes dangerously blank.

  "Why?" Cruz ground out, laying both hands against the wall on either side of Ace's head. "Why did you do that to us? To her?"

  "Hey, that was the deal, right? You promised me you could handle it if I couldn't. You said there'd be someone there for her, no matter what."

  Words whispered in the heat of the moment. A tactical decision. Ace had been paralyzed by the fear of hurting Rachel, and Cruz had told him what he needed to hear. It won't matter. One way or another, she'll be okay.

  He'd said it knowing the most likely alternative was for them to move forward without him. If Rachel had fallen into Ace, Cruz would have let her go. For her happiness, for his--watching the two people he cared most about in the world drift away from him together would have been hellish.

  But not as hellish as watching them fall away alone.

  "It wasn't a deal," Cruz said, fighting his rising anger. "It was a promise."

  Ace shoved at his chest. "Then keep it. Take care of her."

  "If things went wrong, Ace." Cruz shoved back. "Things didn't go wrong. You got scared, or bored, or who the fuck knows. I gave you a chance, and you turned it into an excuse."

  Ace pushed harder this time, with enough force to send Cruz staggering back a few paces. "Are you done with the fucking lecture, brother?"

  Brother. Ace threw the word around like it came free, promising intimacy he would never really feel. Or maybe he did, and that was the first mistake Cruz had made--assuming Ace's usual affections ran shallow, and the glimpses of real emotion Cruz had grasped at had been something more, something just for them.

  Ace loved everyone in the gang just enough to feel real--and no one enough to be real.

  Cruz knew shit about love, but he knew it wasn't abandoning the people who needed you. "You broke her heart." You're breaking mine.

  For a heart-pounding moment he wondered if that was what Ace needed to know. That he wasn't handing over victory to a rival, but leaving two people devastated in his wake. Cruz opened his mouth to tell him, to make himself say the words, no matter how clumsy--

  "Better sooner than later," Ace drawled, a hard, biting edge to his voice. "At least now you know how to fuck her."

  For the first time in his adult life, Cruz lost control of his temper.

  The first punch snapped Ace's chin to the side. The second slammed into his ribs. That was all he got
before Ace started fighting back.

  They'd gone at each other once before, in the cage, for an audience. Cruz could barely remember why, except that Rachel had been wounded and Ace had been to blame, and he'd still been a chivalrous knight in his own imagination, slaying dragons for his damsel.

  But it had never been about her. Not in the ring, where they'd pounded each other against the steel cage until anger had led to a simmering tension Cruz barely knew how to process. And not now, when they smashed into each other, too pissed off to fight effectively, slamming each other into walls with the sort of full-body contact that twisted in Cruz's gut.

  He'd wanted Ace there, that night, wanted to fuck him, wanted to hit him, wanted things more inexplicable and indescribable than both. He'd wanted, and wanting had changed everything.

  Knowing what he was losing changed it again.

  There was no finesse in this fight. No rules. Ace got him with a vicious jab to the ribs before barreling into him, carrying Cruz back against the opposite wall with a force that rattled the workbench and jostled a box of screws to the floor.

  Cruz blocked his next swing and shoved away from the wall, winding up to nail Ace again.

  A feminine hand wrapped around his arm, long nails digging into his skin as Lex's face penetrated the haze of his tunnel vision. "All right, knock it off right now before I take a lead pipe to you both! Jesus fucking Christ."

  His hand itched with the need to connect with Ace's face, but if he swung and took Lex with him, he really would be feeling a lead pipe--or Dallas O'Kane's boot on his face. He let her drag him back a step and looked away from Ace's bleeding nose.

  "Santana," Dallas barked. "Cruz is new, but you know the damn rules. You got shit to deal with, you take it to the cage."

  "I didn't--"

  "Shut up. I'm not joking, Ace. Drag your ass to my office, and do not open your damn mouth until I get there."

  After Ace stomped off, Lex growled and smoothed her hair back into place as she faced Cruz. "O'Kanes don't fight each other, not outside those steel bars. We fight, we fall."

  Cruz remained silent, and Dallas leveled a finger at him. "We don't have time for this bullshit, so you listen to what she says, or you're gonna be hauling trash in Three while the guys I can trust deal with this attack. Understood?"