Piece Us Together (Monstrous Survivors #3)

19. Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Nineteen

Maison

I’m not surprised when Keats asks to talk, but I’m not thrilled about it either. That slight twinge of disappointment is followed by a rush of shame as I realize how selfish that is. I’m one of the lucky ones. My op was successful. I got out alive. I got my brother to safety. I fell in love. Now I get to have Thanksgiving dinners and watch football and be happy.

Keats talking to me likely means he has a mission. There’s a bad guy to be taken down, or an innocent to be saved. What kind of person feels annoyed at that kind of disruption? A selfish one, obviously. A bad man like me.

I lead Keats to the reading cove in the hall, figuring it’s a good place for privacy without us going all the way to my office. We can still be seen from certain angles because of the house’s open floor plan, but the conversation shouldn’t be overheard. If he’s worried, I know he’ll move us. Keats isn’t the type of guy to keep quiet when he disagrees.

“Nolan made an amazing meal,” is how he begins. “It’s great seeing him so happy. Seeing all of them.”

I’ve worked with Keats long enough to already know what direction this conversation is going to take based off those three sentences. There’s a mission he wants me to join, and it’s going to be a rescue.

I swallow the sudden pang of fear, of dread. This is my job. I have to do my job. It’s what I’m fucking for.

Still, I cling to the topic of Nolan, hoping I’m wrong. Maybe he wants to talk about Bryce? Maybe he wants to come visit more? Maybe he’s asking for a favor, but it’s not a mission, it’s something else?

Hell, maybe he is the head and he’s about to fucking confess.

Anything but a mission.

I’m so fucking selfish.

“He’s been looking forward to this for a while,” I decide to say. “I’ve tasted half a dozen mashed potato recipes and way too many variations of stuffing. He wanted it to be perfect for everyone.”

“As much as everyone loved the food, I think just being here is enough. Even Matt was all smiles today.”

“He’s been doing really well since we moved here, actually. It’s been nice to see him come out of his shell more.”

“Good. That’s—fuck, that’s good.” His eyes move over my shoulder. I know without looking that he can see Bryce. “And everyone else? They’re all doing good?”

I don’t smirk. It’d be too hypocritical considering the mess of a situation I’ve got going on. It’s less amusing to see him so torn up over Bryce now that I’ve seen the same kind of pain reflected in Hunter’s eyes.

“Everyone is great. They’re all finding their places in the world and starting to finally feel settled.”

“Good.” He stares a moment longer before blinking and averting his attention back to me. His expression shifts. It’s time for business now. Fuck. “One of my buddies needs help with an op. Ideally, he wants three of us. I still need to talk to Trav, but I’m hoping you’ll come along. Figured I’d get you on board first.”

He says it like it’s a choice for me. Like I could say no. It’d be laughable if I wasn’t already fighting panic.

“It’s Hyde,” he adds when I don’t manage to agree as quickly as I should. He looks confused at my silence, like he can’t fathom why I’d be hesitating. This is what I’m good for, after all. This is what I owe. “You’ve worked with Hyde, right? He actually requested you.”

I have worked with Hyde. He’s one of my favorite contract workers I’ve teamed up with over the years, cleaning up messy mistakes and tying up loose ends. I probably trusted him the most out of anyone I worked with outside of the team this past decade, before meeting Keats at least. I trusted him enough to ask him for favors without formal contracts. Enough to help him out the same way. Enough to let him fuck me—though our guns were always still in reach, I wasn’t an idiot. Enough to form a connection in a time when I wasn’t really allowed to connect with anyone at all.

If Hyde is asking for me, I can’t say no.

“I thought he was retired?”

“Semi-retired. He can share what he wants when you see him, but this is personal for him. Sort of. I—he’ll have to explain himself. But it’s a mission of his own. Not a contract. He works for himself now.”

I focus on what’s important—there’s someone who needs saving.

This is what you do. This is who you are. These people you saved are why you do it. You owe it to them. To Carter. To Nolan.

“How soon?” I ask, my voice coming out all thick and wrong.

Keats frowns, but he doesn’t question me on it. “Fairly soon. I put the file on your office desk. Read it when you can.”

“You think it’ll be tonight?” I ask, suddenly thinking of the whiskey bottle I’ve been eyeing all night.

He shakes his head. “It won’t be any sooner than Sunday, I’d think. There are a few pieces that still need to fall in place.”

I nod at him, forcing a cocky grin. “I’ll be ready.”

Keats gives my shoulder a firm squeeze before heading toward everyone else. I give the direction a glance, wondering if I should sneak away to see the file now or later. My eyes catch on Hunter before I can decide. He’s looking right at me. Watching me. He’s been watching, I can tell by the expression on his face. It’s too worried. Too searching. The kind of gaze he uses when he’s trying to decide what’s best for me, trying to figure me out.

I turn away and head toward my office before he can see the truth. I already know what’s best for me. I intend on doing the opposite anyway.

It’s cold. Probably too fucking cold to be standing out here in nothing but a sweater. The whiskey is warming me from the inside out, though. Besides a little windburn on my cheeks, I feel pretty alright.

Well, physically . I feel alright physically.

That file was a hard one. That file—this mission—is going to be one of the ones that haunt me. I can already feel the ghost of it in the back of my mind. I can already feel the absolute darkness that exists in this world closing in on me.

I take another drink. It burns. I like that. Makes the sting in my eyes make sense.

The door behind me slides open. Reflex has me wanting to look over my shoulder, but I fight it. I don’t want to know. Regardless of who it is, I have a feeling I don’t want to hear what they have to say. My head is already too fucking full between what Keats dropped on me and the fucking Hunter of it all.

Shoes crunch on the light layer of snow dusting the back deck, stopping just to my right where I stand in front of the railing. I close my eyes, his cologne permeating the air already. Of course it’s him. I bring the whiskey back to my lips.

“You’re having a bad night,” Hunter points out.

I grunt in acknowledgment, deciding it’d be stupid to argue. He’s the all-knowing dom, after all, and I’ve never been very good at hiding things when I’m drunk.

“Is it because of the holiday? Carter? Whatever that man—Keats?—was talking to you about?” He turns so he can look at me. I keep my eyes focused on the river. “Is it because of me?”

I jerk, nearly dropping the whiskey. He’s frowning when I turn to him, concern etched in the furrow of his brow. He’s not wearing a fucking jacket— again .

“Why’d it be you?”

“Maybe you’re realizing that you don’t like your two worlds mixing.”

You’re not one of my worlds, I think.

But…isn’t he?

“You’re different here,” he says softly, as if the observation isn’t dangerous.

Maybe I’m a masochist like Nolan because I ask, “How so?”

He eyes me. I can tell he’s trying to decide how honest he wants to be. Cards on the table, boys. I’m yours. There are layers inside of me, created by those words. Panic and confusion and joy and relief all overlapping and bleeding until I can’t identify one from the next.

“You’re drowning here. Like at the pub. Like in the alley.” I close my eyes. I am. I’m drowning. Save me, please. “Do you pretend for them or for yourself?”

“Pretend what?” I croak.

“That you’re okay.”

I take a swig of my whiskey. When I bring the bottle down to my side, he reaches out. I tell myself to move away. I tell myself to yell at him. I tell myself to remind him he’s not my fucking dom.

I let him take the bottle.

His fingertips are warm where they brush against mine.

“There you go, noticing things again.” It’s meant to be angry. Annoyed. It comes out too soft though. Almost relieved.

“It’s my job.”

“You’re not—” I stop, the rest of the sentence sticking in my throat. I stare at the bottle he’s now holding, wishing for the whiskey to burn it away.

“I’m not your dom, no.” He smiles. It’s impossibly sad. I want to make it disappear. I want to kiss it gone. “But I still care about you.”

Fuck, I’m drunk.

I am much more drunk than I thought.

His lips would be soft against mine. I bet he’d take control. I bet he’d dominate my mouth until I’m brainless and all his.

But he’d find out the truth, eventually.

He’d find out I’m broken in all the ways that don’t deserve repair.

“Maybe I’m not worth caring about.”

“I don’t believe that.”

“You don’t know me, Hunter.”

He tilts his head. “Don’t I?”

I’ve killed people. I’ve done worse than kill people. I got my own brother raped. I sat there and fucking watched.

I can’t fall in love with you.

I think maybe it’s too late.

I ruin everything I touch.

I don’t want to ruin you.

“Hunter.”

“Yes?”

I look right at him. “I don’t want to fall in love with you.”

There’s a split second where he loses control of himself. His expression cracks and there’s so much emotion that pours out I could choke on it. Then he’s tugging it all back until he’s the calm, steady dom he usually is. “Okay.”

“Can you stop? Please?” I curl my hands into fists, not wanting him to see them shake. “I need you to stop.”

He takes a step closer, worry evident in his expression. “Stop what, Maison?”

“Making me.”

He doesn’t understand for a moment.

Then he does.

His smile is unbelievably sad, his voice soft, low, hurt. “Would it be so terrible? To love me?”

I can feel a sob in my chest. If I open my mouth, it’ll spill out. It’ll give me away. It’ll ruin everything.

I step back instead. Retreat. He tracks my movements without following, my whiskey bottle still clutched in his hand.

When I’m close enough to the door to grab the handle, he stops me with a sharp, “Maison.”

I take a breath before turning back to him. He hesitates before slowly approaching me. His eyes are back to searching. I don’t try to hide. I’m so tired of hiding. He sees me anyway. I think he always has.

He lifts a hand. I watch it, my pulse a frantic thing inside me. I don’t stop him. His fingers are freezing, but gentle against my eyebrow. I have a scar there. He touches it, but he’s looking into my eyes as he does.

“For what it’s worth,” he says so softly even the cold air doesn’t pick up on it, no cloud forming between us. “You’re making me, too. The both of you.”

“Is it scary?” I ask, because I have to know.

“Yes.”

My heart sinks. “Because I’m bad?”

His brow furrows as he steps closer. His fingers move from my eyebrow to my cheek. His thumb rubs a circle of warmth on my cold skin. “You’re not bad, Maison. Not even a little.”

“You don’t know anything about me,” I whisper, returning to my previous argument.

He gives me the same response as before, even tilting his head again. “Don’t I?”

I close my eyes. I can’t look at him. I’m breaking apart and he’s going to see and I can’t fucking look at him. “ Hunter .”

“I know you, Maison. Details don’t matter.” I feel his hand settle against my chest, over my panicking heart. “I know you.”

If you really knew me, you’d never touch me again.

“Come over tonight.”

The surprise has me opening my eyes. He’s so close now. The curves of his cheeks and the tip of his nose are pink. I’m pissed I didn’t grab a jacket for myself. I want to be able to give him something. “I’m drunk. It’s against the rules.”

“You think I only want you two if I get to play with you?” He steps into me, his stomach against mine. His hand is trapped between our chests.

Someone could see.

I don’t move away. I try, I fucking try, but I can’t.

Instead, I find my hands on his waist, the fabric of his shirt clenched in my fists.

“Come over, when this party comes to an end. Nolan has only had one drink with dinner. He’ll drive.” The tone he uses makes it clear that the only reason this isn’t an order is because of the limits I’ve set for us. It makes it clear that he very much wants me to choose to obey. “Spend the weekend.”

“Hunter—”

“No love talk. Just the three of us being together. We can watch more superhero movies and eat Nolan’s food and spoil him rotten.”

I want that.

Can I really have that? No worrying? No deeper feelings? Just the three of us together, happy, calm, safe?

“Bucky Barnes is alive,” I tell him.

He blinks at me. “Oh?”

“If we make it to Winter Soldier this weekend, Nolan will be horny as fuck.”

His smile is slow growing, but it’s genuine and bright and full of the same relief I can feel in my chest when I look at it. “That sounds delightful.”

“You can’t tell him I told you, though. Act surprised.”

“Oh my god, Bucky! But he died!” he says in a shockingly convincing voice, his eyes all wide and his mouth open in surprise.

I laugh.

God, I laugh and it feels so fucking good .

What is he doing to me?

“Come on.” I touch my palm to his cheek just long enough to feel how cold it is. He presses into the touch, eyelashes fluttering. It makes me feel powerful, having him react to me like that. He’s a man who has the world in his hands and can make it behave as he sees fit, and he just melted beneath my touch. “Let’s get you inside. It’s freezing.”

He smiles. It’s indulgent, both of us aware that I’m not the one in charge here, that he’s just letting me pretend. How fucking beautiful is that? The minute we leave here, I can stop pretending. The minute we leave here, I can just be Maison. Not Carter’s brother. Not an operative. Not the anti-hero or the sympathetic villain or whatever the fuck I am. Just Maison. Hunter’s Maison.

I can’t get us out of here fast enough.

The three of us are exhausted by the time Nolan and I get to Hunter’s. There are leftovers Nolan places in the fridge, and a pie he hid from everyone since he made it just for Hunter. We eat small slices and drink hot cider. I feel drunk even though I should be mostly sober. When Hunter smiles at us and asks if we’re ready for bed, I ask, “Will you stay with us again?”

He sighs, all relief and soft happiness. “Yes. Please.”

Things are quiet after that, the three of us moving around each other in a variation of our usual routine. We end up in bed, me on the left of Nolan, Hunter on his right, without having to discuss or coordinate. We frame him between us, a pile of blankets draped over our bodies to warm us from the chill in the air. Hunter whispers, “Goodnight, my boys,” and I don’t correct him, I just smile like an idiot. Nolan mumbles goodnight, already sounding as if he’s drifting off. I add my own after.

One moment I’m in the bed, Nolan nestled against my chest, Hunter’s hand on my hip, and a smile on my lips.

The next, I’m in my childhood home.

It’s dark. Empty. There are people outside the window. Monsters disguised as humans. Carter is being raped on our old dining room table.

I try the door. I know, for some fucking reason, I know, that it won’t open. But I try anyway. I try the handle. I try to slam into the weak points to break straight through. I claw at the edges.

I stumble to the window, hands pressed against the glass. I know it won’t break in the same way I knew the door wouldn’t budge. There’s blood on my hands. It’s dripping down my wrists to my elbows. When I pull my hands away, I know there will be prints left behind.

Whose blood is that?

Whose fucking blood is on my hands?

There’s a burst of cruel laughter, my attention snapping back to the sight outside. I used to run through the sprinkler in that yard. We had cookouts. I helped Carter chase butterflies.

Nolan is wandering through the grass, blindfolded like the first time I met him with his arms cuffed behind his back. Men are tripping him, then making him get back to his feet without his hands for help. He’s covered in blood and dirt and bits of grass. He falls again. Again. Again.

A man crawls on top of him before Nolan can try to get up again, practically tearing at the button of his own pants. I slam my hands against the glass, again and again. They’re too slippery. I can’t get a purchase. It’s all I can see—blood everywhere, painted over the scene outside, tinting it with the promise of death.

I scream.

I scream as hard as I can.

I scream until blood is pouring from my mouth onto the floor.

I slip. Stand back up. Slip again. I try drying my hands on my shirt, but when I look down I realize I’m naked. There’s something—fuck, my back. My back is on fire. Why is my back—

Nolan sobs. I press up against the glass, somehow able to see him through the blood.

There’s a hand fisted in his hair, pulling his head back so he’s facing me. He screams my name.

The man raping him looks up. Looks right at me. His green eyes are bright despite the darkness. His grin is evil.

Hunter.

“You let him in,” Travis says, standing beside me. I practically jump out of my fucking skin.

“How did you get in here? Show me. Show me how to get out!”

“That’s your fault,” he says, ignoring me. He points at the scene. I don’t know if he’s talking about Carter or Nolan. It doesn’t matter. Either way, he’s right.

There’s a whip in the hand he uses to point.

It’s bloody.

It was being used on my back.

It’ll probably be used again.

“You handed him right over,” he muses. “Didn’t even put up a fight. Was your idea, even.” He shakes his head, laughing darkly. “Please, Travis, save my brother, buy him, please,” he says in a mocking tone. Then, in a flippant voice, “Hey, Hunter, here’s the man I love, mind raping him a few times, it’s the only way he gets off.”

“I didn’t—that’s not how it went. That’s not—it isn’t—”

“It’s all your fault.” He’s standing behind me now. I don’t know how he got there. “You know that, right? It’s all your fault.”

“Yeah.” I press my forehead to the blood-stained glass. “I know.”

The whip rains down on me.

It slices through more than skin. It slices through something vital. Something inside of me that can never be repaired.

“I’m sorry!” I scream, praying they can hear me outside like I can hear them. “I’m sorry. Fuck, I’m so sorry. Trav, show me how to get out, Trav, please, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, help me, I’m sorry—”

If anyone hears me, they don’t care.

Maybe that’s what I deserve.

It’s all my fault, anyway.