But now’s not the time. I shake the thought from my head and scramble for pants and a shirt, because we were both lounging around in boxers in the warm apartment. Micah follows me to the bedroom and also pulls on some clothes, but at a ridiculously slow pace.
“Calm down,” he whispers. “It’s probably just Tristan. He works nights, too. And I asked him to look into getting you some meds.”
I freeze, one leg in some dirty jeans and one leg still bare. The implications of that are too much to process in this moment and fracture through my mind, a mixture of anxiety that Micah included more people in my shameful—and potentially lethal, if Father finds out and loses his shit—secret, but also warm that he would care enough to try and fix something that’s patently unfixable.
“Stay here,” I hiss before shoving my other leg into the jeans and zipping them up, following them with a t-shirt. It must be his, because it’s way too fucking tight, but there’s more pounding coming from the door, so I don’t have time to find one ofmine. At least I remember to snag my gun from where I left it in the bathroom before everything changed. Not my actual gun, of course, which has mysteriouslydisappeared, with Micah insisting he doesn’t know anything about it. Butagun.
Of course, he trails me to the door. I put a hand on his chest, keeping him at arm’s length as I look through the peephole and praying he’s right, and it’s his friend. I would even take Colm. Colm, by himself, would have the decency to not see whatever weird state the apartment and my face are probably in.
Jesus fucking Christ, do either of us have hickeys?
My stomach bottoms out, and I don’t let myself think about that anymore because I have to open the door, no matter who is on the other side.
It’s dark outside, so it takes me a minute for my eyes to come into focus. And another minute for my brain to catch up with what they’re seeing. I’m standing frozen for long enough that Micah pushes me to the side and looks for himself, letting out a little gasp of shock before he recovers himself.
I don’t know what expression I’m wearing, but I must look terrible, because he holds my gaze for just a second and mouths the wordbreathe.
Then he nods once, stiffly, like everything might be okay, and muscles me out of the way to open the door, adopting the stance I recognize as his no-bullshit posture.
“What the fuck do you want, Patrick?”
There’s a faint growl from the other side of the door, and my stomach would bottom out if it had anywhere else to go.
“Let me in, boy, before I knock this door down. It took you long enough to answer, what the fuck were you doing?”
The door creaks open slowly, like something out of a horror movie, and Micah is forced to move back to accommodate it.
“It’s 2am. Most people are asleep. I repeat, what do you want?”
Micah’s arms are crossed over his chest and his chin is tilted up, but there’s a very faint tremble to his voice that hopefully only I notice.
Then my father slips through the doorway, his eyes immediately locking on me and taking me in from head to toe. It’s like being scanned by a Terminator. I don’t know what he sees when he looks at me and I never have, but I have no doubt it’s not good.
His face is completely neutral as he closes the door behind him and crosses his own arms.
“Ah. Savage, there you are. Just who I was looking for.”
I swallow hard, because I don’t know what else to say. Words left me a long time ago, and every inch of my skin that’s visible to him feels like it’s screaming loud enough to be heard over any words that might come out of my mouth, anyway.
The silence is awkward, and Micah keeps looking between us like he wants to diffuse it but doesn’t know how. Finally, it’s Father that speaks.
“Shall we?” He points to the couch where I was sitting—no,snuggling—with Micah just a few minutes ago, and my stomach turns.
“Sure.” The sound squeezes through frozen vocal cords. “Sorry. Hello, Father. Please, come in.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Micah
The tension in the room immediately ratchets up to something close to unbearable as soon as Patrick steps inside. Tadhg is watching him, keeping his body just out of arm’s reach—out of habit, I assume—but with all of his focus trained on his father. His shoulders are back and his chest out, and I swear he’s standing taller than normal.
Most people wouldn’t be able to see through the act. I can, though. I can practically see the way his pulse is racing by the fluttering of his throat, and I know his eyes are just a little wider than they should be.
“How can we help you?” he asks his father, voice unnervingly level.
Once the door is shut behind him, Patrick swings his head from side to side to take us both in. I’m carefully standing on the opposite side of him to Tadhg. I’m pretty sure the thought that his precious little killing machine was bending over and taking it from any man would never occur to Patrick, even if he walkedinto the roomin medias res. That’s in an entirely different stratosphere from the things he considers possible.
However, I’m also sure it’s the only thing that my brother—shit, must stop thinking that, EX-stepbrother, maybe kinda sorta future boyfriend?—is thinking about right now is what we just did. He’s probably convinced Patrick can smell it on him. I do a quick visual scan of him and the apartment, and there’s nothing screaming ‘sex’ that I can see. We just have to get through this conversation without anyone starting a fight or having a meltdown, and everything will be fine.
