And it had cost me everything.
Because there was no doubt in my mind that if I’d admitted to the world what Pierce had been to me, and who I’d really been, Pierce would still be alive. Instead of going to Vincent’s house upon completing his final deployment, he’d have come to me. He wouldn’t have been used as a pawn to get to Vincent.
And I had to believe that the men who’d killed Pierce wouldn’t have gotten to Vincent – that he’d have found some way to neutralize the danger beforehand.
I sighed because I fucking hated when I did this to myself. Playing this ugly what-if game didn’t serve any purpose. Pierce was gone and Vincent had been given a second chance at the perfect life.
His very own nirvana.
I glanced at my phone and saw that it was well after dinner. Vincent and Nathan would be in Charleston getting ready for the rally the following day that was meant to lure the man hunting Nathan out of hiding. Vincent had told me that he and Ronan had gone to great lengths to make sure that Nathan would be covered from every angle, but I was still nervous for both of them. Vincent knew how to handle himself, but the guy pursuing Nathan seemed both determined and skilled.
A deadly combination.
My thoughts drifted to Ronan and the men who worked for him. And that thought inevitably led me to Reese.
Despite the fact that Ronan gave me periodic updates on how Reese was doing as one of the operatives in his underground vigilante group, there were so many things he couldn’t tell me. Was Reese happy? Or was he letting his bitterness toward me take away any joy he might have been feeling? Was he in a relationship? Even thinking about it? Was he healthy?
Fuck, I didn’t even have the most basic answers a father should have about his own child.
You could reach out to him…
I shook my head at my inner voice. No, that wasn’t an option. If Reese found out I’d asked Ronan to watch over him after some guys Reese had once worked with had come gunning for him, Reese would turn his back on Ronan and whatever life he’d built for himself solely to spite me. I owed Reese a lot of things, but first and foremost, I owed him distance. He’d made it more than clear that was all he’d wanted since the moment he’d walked in on me and Pierce that night so long ago.
My son had had the power to destroy both Pierce’s and my careers, but he’d chosen not to. Instead, he’d finished out his stint in the military, then after his mother’s death a few years ago, he’d disappeared completely. He might as well have fallen off the face of the earth. I’d quietly searched for him, but it wasn’t until I’d received a late-night call a year earlier from a man from my past that I’d finally learned that my son was alive – but that he wouldn’tbe for long. I hadn’t hesitated for even a second when I’d learned what Ronan and the men who worked for him were capable of – and that they didn’t always stay on the right side of the law to do their jobs. No, I’d begged Ronan to do for Reese what he’d done for me so many years earlier.
Save him.
“We’re here, Mr. President.”
Nash’s voice intruded on my thoughts and I realized I’d somehow managed to completely lose track of the time. A glance at the clock on the dash showed it was just before midnight. I knew I needed to stop making the daily trip to visit Pierce, since it was a four-hour drive each way, but just the thought of not being close to him made something inside of me bleed.
Well, bleed harder, since it seemed like there was a gaping wound in my chest that had never healed and probably never would.
I knew it was seeing Nathan and Vincent together for the first time a week earlier that had set off my need to be physically close to Pierce, but I wasn’t sure I understood thewhyof it. When I’d still been in office, Grady had gone through great pains to sneak me and a limited number of agents out of the White House late each night so I could go to the cemetery well after it had closed. Sometimes I’d talked to Pierce, sometimes I’d just soaked in the silence of the evening air.
There were times that it had almost felt like Pierce and I were sitting on that porch he’d promised me, swaying lazily back and forth in a porch swing, his heavy arm draped over my shoulder, his warmth seeping into my side as I pressed up against him. I’d inevitably be cruelly returned to reality when Grady would stir me from my stupor and remind me that we needed to get back.
I’d hated Grady in those moments and I’d unfairly unloaded all my rage and bitterness on him – as if he’d been the one keeping me and Pierce apart in the years before Pierce’s death.
And my friend had let me do that to him without any kind of hesitation. Even on the few occasions I’d physically lashed out at him in my grief, he’d urged me on.
Because he’d known it was the only outlet I’d ever have.
There were just too many secrets that had needed to be kept.
About me.
Vincent.
Even Pierce.
But there had come a time when even having Grady stand in as a metaphorical punching bag hadn’t been enough…
“Mr. President?”
I shook my head to clear away the dark memory that threatened to overtake me and climbed through the door Nash was holding open for me. I didn’t bother waiting for him, even though I knew he preferred it when I did. I had no clue if it was protocol or not, but Nash liked to check the house himself whenever we arrived back at it. The agent who worked the evening shift would have already had eyes on the house all night, but Nash was Nash.
But I also wasn’t in the mood. I just wanted him gone.
