"I'm sorry for being so rough with you," I murmur, guilt beginning to coil in my chest.
Guilt is almost as foreign to me as jealousy. Two emotions that Leo seems to be inspiring in me with frightening ease and frequency.
Leo gives me an even angrier look then and gives my side a quick thump. It doesn't hurt, but the shock of it is enough to catch me off guard.
"That's not what you should be sorry for, you twat. Ilikedthe roughness," Leo tells me like I'm a small, stupid child. He lowers his head and presses a confusingly soft kiss to my jaw. His expression melts from enraged to sad, and it's far more painful to think I've upset him in that way.
"Then what?" I ask, feeling out of my depth and weirdly scared, unsure if I want to know the answer.
Leo lets out a tired sigh and regards me for a moment, like he's trying to see into my head and understand the hieroglyphics scraped into the walls of it.
"You don't need to protect me like that, Jack. I'm not afraid you'll hurt me." He sounds so sure, so convinced of his belief in me. "Youwouldn't."
It's clear to me that Leo isn't just talking about how I could hurt him physically. He means the other stuff too.
"I might. I could let you down. I've done it before." With Dan. He meant everything to me, but I still failed to protect him.
I'd rather slit my own throat than let that happen again.
Leo offers me a kind, almost fond, smile. I want to take a mental picture of it and keep it folded away in my mind forever. No one has looked at me like that since my mum. My memories of her are few, but Idoremember. I remember that she loved me, that she thought I mattered, that I was special to her. I was special to Dan, too, although we could never afford to treat each other with the same gentleness. Now they're both gone, and I'm here with a good man who I'm terrified of losing, let alone being the cause of that loss.
"I can handle myself," Leo tells me, and it's both a truth and a lie. He presses another kiss to my jaw, and in response, I curl around him, holding him close and safe against me. His eyes shine with that same golden light of emotion, pleased by the gesture. "You won't break me," he says, quiet and sure.
"You won't let me?" I ask with honest hope.
That sadness returns to his face, and I want to banish it immediately.
Leo lowers himself back down to take my mouth in a kiss that lasts and lasts and lasts. He kisses me until my mind is pleasantly buzzing, and my mouth feels as used as his throat probably does.
Leo pulls away to speak against my lips, whispering like he's making a promise to both of us. "Jack, come on.Youwon't let you."
Hope fizzles and dies, scorched from existence by the lightning power of Leo's reckless faith, ashy remains blown away with the wind.
Chapter two
Leo
Wepretendtosleepfor a couple of hours before getting up to head for the airport. It takes a little over an hour from our FISA safe house. Jack is confusingly subdued after last night, drawing back into himself like a turtle retreating to the safety of his protective shell. I’m unwilling to poke at him any more than I already have, afraid we'll just end up fighting or fucking, neither of which would be very helpful to our latest mission.
I feel like all we've done for the last month is fail. Every lead we've chased down has led to nothing but near misses and dead ends. Jack doesn't think Ian Stone will kill his son, because he always asked for Rohan to be retrieved alive. But there's a gulf of difference between alive and safe, a lot of space for terror and despair to seep in and spread like an infection.
I shouldn't have pushed Jack so hard about Titanus Bullet. He clearly didn't want to talk about whatever the real issue is between him and the infamous arms dealer. But for some reason, I felt the need to dig my heels in and demand answers he wasn't ready to give.
As much as I want to respect Jack's right to his secrets, I'm also aware of how precarious our situation is. One wrong move could lead to disaster. I'm afraid if we go into this new mission having only shared half the information between us, it might wind up the same as all our other ones. Just another big “X” to mark on a report form, another tick of the clock, the countdown on Rohan’s fate.
Jack seems to think it's a matter of trusting him, but it isn't. Do I believe Jack will have my back no matter what? Yes, absolutely. Do I trust him not to withhold vital intel? No. If he thinks my knowing about it will only cause a hassle, he'll lie right to my face. If anything, I'd say it's Jack who doesn't trust me to have his back. He still sees me as vulnerable, and I suppose, in comparison to him, I am. But that doesn't make me useless or weak. I don't need his protection, certainly not to this degree, and not at the expense of our missions.
We get to the airport a few hours before our flight is scheduled to take off, but it takes at least an hour to get through security. We're held up because of our weapons, having to provide our FISA credentials to scores of people and answer a hundred questions with the same "it's classified" style response.
Jack becomes visibly agitated the more time we spend with airport security. I would have suggested just leaving our guns at the safe house, as it's likely we could have gotten new ones from North when we touched down in Senjatas. But I knew Jack would refuse to be parted with his precious Siggy, which incidentally, he treats more like a trusted partner than he does me. Probably sees it as more reliable in the killing people department, which I suppose is true. Guns can't hesitate.
Once we're released from the avid attention of airport security, we only have a little time to grab some food before we head to our gate and load onto the flight.
Faced with hours on a plane with Jack, trapped in awkward silence, I finally decide it's worth prodding at the Do Not Disturb barrier Jack has erected in my honour. I turn to him from my seat nearest the plane window. Jack always insists on taking the aisle seat. He doesn't like to be pinned in, especially as we're already trapped on a massive tin can flying through the air.
"Want to hear a funny story?" I ask.
Jack regards me warily. "Depends, will I be laughing with you or at you?"
