“Hires people, gives advice on how to set up security systems, lots of things, I guess,” Marcus replied, sounding uncertain about the details.
“Right.”
He stared at the screen, doing his best to ignore the way Marcus was staring holes through him. He was doing his best to stay calm, to steady his breathing, to unclench his fists.
He’d been so naïve, for so long. First Oli. Now the rest of his team. None of it had been built to last. He’d buried his damned head in the sand for years. Time for him to wake the fuck up.
“Oh, come on,” Marcus said, after a minute of awkward silence.
“What?” Aberlour asked, refusing to look at his friend. He’d known Marcus’ invitation to watch football at his house had been a damned trap from the get-go. He just—well, this wasn’t the trap he’d thought he’d fall into.
He just wasn’t sure it was any better. Pain was pain.
“You got a good job offer, your contract’s up at the end of the year, and your wife is pregnant,” he shrugged. What more was there to say? Had he expected it? No, but not because it wasn’t logical. Rather, Aberlour was a dumb fuck who liked to avoid things until they stabbed him in the gut, and the bleeding made it impossible to ignore. Now he had two massive wounds to deal with. Oh, joy.
“You understand?” Marcus asked, worried, staring holes into the side of Aberlour’s face again.
Aberlour took a deep breath, gathered his courage, and turned to face Marcus. There was so much going on right now on his friend’s face. Guilt, excitement, worry. All of it right there for Aberlour to read. An open book, as always.
“Of course, I do,” he said, softly. He forced a smile he didn’t feel and said, “I’m happy for you.” That much was true at least. He was happy for Marcus. Happy for him and his wife, and for that child who’d get to have a father who stayed at home and didn’t ship out for six months at a time.
Marcus’ expression cleared miraculously, and his smile widened as he visibly relaxed.
“We gave a lot, you know? We paid our dues,” he added with a shrug. “I’d like to see my daughter grow up.” Leaning back, he propped his feet up on the coffee table.
“’Course,” Aberlour agreed. “That kid’s lucky to have you,” he added, holding out his beer for Marcus to tap it.
“Think maybe JD’s thinking about it too, and if JD goes, I think Ghost might go with him as well. I know MJ has been talking to him about it, but he wouldn’t leave on his own.”
In Aberlour’s mind, he saw the wind whip right through his castle made of cards. This tall building—the permanent stronghold known as Team Specter—now appeared to be nothing more than a house of cards. All along, he’d been thinking it was made of titanium. Imagine his surprise as each level toppled to the ground. Here was definitive proof that he’d truly mastered the art of self-deception.
His men were leaving. His team was dismantling. They had lives. Fiancés and children. They’d go their separate ways. They’d find other occupations and things to do with their time, so the castle that Aberlour had painstakingly constructed would very soon be a simple tent. Two flimsy side walls, propped up with a few pieces of thin metal, waiting for the final blow to collapse the whole damned thing.
“I don’t know about Carlos, but I think that guy might never retire,” Marcus observed and then chuckled.
Aberlour wasn’t sure who he was talking to anymore. He heard the words, but nothing really sank in. Sitting there stunned into silence, staring blindly at the TV, Aberlour saw his whole world unravelling all at once. This was a goddamned nightmare.
“Oliver and you could—well, you could do anything, really.” Marcus appeared to be winding down a bit as he turned to Aberlour expectantly.
There was nothing Abe could say. Not really. If this was what they all wanted, he’d watch them go on to the next chapter in their lives. But he wouldn’t be following them. He wasn’t sure he could. He wasn’t sure he knew how.
“Oliver is going to marry her,” Aberlour said, the words escaping despite his best effort to contain them.
“Don’t—”
“He’ll marry her. They’ll have kids. If you guys leave, he’ll follow. Plenty of opportunities for him, and he always wanted to be a dad.”
Had he known this? Before right then? Had he known for sure, as he did now, that he would never belong to Oli again? Maybe not, because in this moment he realized he was completely and irrevocably broken inside. Cracked right smack down the middle. Right there, sitting on Marcus’ couch, he splintered and broke wide open like a rock that had been hammered hard enough that it shattered.
“Aberlour?”
The quarterback threw another great pass. His targeted wide receiver leaped into the air to catch it. He’d barely touched the ball before getting knocked sideways by one of the opposing team’s linebackers. The football fell to the grass.
Pass incomplete. So close, yet so far.
“It’s all good, Mac,” he said, after a moment, desperately scrambling for a semblance of normalcy. His old friend frowned at his using the nickname that was an old one they’d stopped using years ago.
“I’m happy for you.” Aberlour worked up a quick smile that certainly wasn’t his best effort, but he didn’t think Marcus could tell the difference.
