“I see,” Michael admitted.
Did he?
Losing him was the one thing he’d never been able to let go of in his life. It hurt that he’d been right, and that when D’Artangnan walked out that door, he’d moved on.
Without him.
Now, he wanted to weep.
“Did you love him?” Graham finally asked, hating that he needed to know, but he did.
Maybe it was to know, or maybe it was to hurt himself, but why not add to the pain?
At his question, Michael was honest.
“In a way, yes. He was my rebound guy. For six years, I bounced around, felt sorry for myself, and did everything to forget about you, Graham. It never worked. I see that now. I know why I picked Riley. He was a lot like you. Only, he wasmissing one thing that I never noticed, and it was the most important thing.”
Graham turned around, bare and stripped down to his soul for this man.
“What was that, D’Artangnan?” he asked.
“Honor. He didn’t have an ounce of your honor,” he admitted, moving closer to him. “I’m sorry I left you, and I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the truth when I was leaving.”
Graham stared into his deep blue eyes, and needed to know.
“Why did you leave me? Why when I said stay or it was over did you choose to leave me? Was it the ultimatum that pissed you off? Was something better waiting for you? Why did you abandon us?”
He was about a foot from the man’s body. They were both naked, and staring into each other’s eyes.
“Do you really want to know?” he asked.
The man nodded.
“I need to know so I can survive this. I feel like I’ve been dangling over sharp rocks and I’m not able to hold on anymore. I have nothing left, D’Artangnan. I’m so empty and hollow that I feel like I’m going to crush in on myself like an old tin can. I’m dying inside, and I can’t stop it no matter what I do.”
Yeah, that he understood.
So, he told him.
“I signed up for a highly classified job as protection duty. I wasn’t able to tell you about it because again, it was classified. I signed papers, and I became an Archangel, thus the name, Michael, and why you couldn’t find me.”
Graham just listened, and it wasn’t lost on him that somehow in his dream, he knew this.
Had the spirits given him this insight?
A higher power?
Because he shouldn’t know this—until that moment—but he did.
Was Fate in control?
“I took that job because it paid a shit ton of money. I wanted to set us up in a nice home, so we could have a family and never be poor again. I wanted to work for that year so I could buy you the home you deserved. So that I could be that provider for you. So that we could have everything we needed for a change.”
The words…
They were a brutal blow to his chest because his dream had been right, and it hadn’t been his brain trying to fill in gaps with his hopes.
It was so shocking that Graham actually had to lean on the counter as his legs got wobbly from the shock of what he could have had.
