Evan kissed him.
Right there in the Fury parking lot. Winter afternoon. Facility behind them. Suits thirty feet away. Anyone watching from any window. Evan’s palm came up to Finn’s jaw, thumb along the bone, fingers curling behind his ear, and he kissed him without checking, without the half-second pause where the calculation used to live. Just warm lips against cold, the taste of coffee and road and relief.
When they broke apart Finn’s eyes were wet and he did not wipe them.
“You showed up,” he said.
“I should have shown up weeks ago.”
“Yeah.” Finn’s mouth curved. “But you’re here now.”
* * *
The afternoon eval ran long.
Evan waited in the lobby, wide glass-walled space with low leather chairs and a display case of Fury jerseys glowing behind the reception desk. He sat with palms flat on his knees, posture too straight for the room.
Finn’s agent came through twice. The second time he stopped three feet away and studied Evan.
“Tremblay.” Flat. Testing.
“Yes.”
The agent nodded once and kept walking.
Finn came out in base layers, hair damp from the shower and curling at his temples. He saw Evan and stopped mid-stride. His face did the thing. Slight widening at the eyes, softening at the mouth, there and gone in the space of one breath. Evan caught it. He always caught it.
“Hi,” Finn said.
“Hi.”
“You waited.”
“Yes.”
Finn studied the straight line of Evan’s spine, the palms pressed to his knees. Evan looked like he would sit there another four hours if that was what it took.
“You want to get dinner?”
“Yes.” Evan glanced toward the elevator. “Your agent said the Fury put you up at the hotel across the street. Can we go upstairs first?”
“Yeah.” Finn grinned, small and real. “Yeah, we can do that.”
They went upstairs.
* * *
The hotel room was warm. White duvet pulled tight across the bed, desk with a leather folio, window looking out at the parkingstructure. The bedside lamp threw amber light across the carpet.
They stood inside it and looked at each other.
Finn laughed first. Short, surprised sound. “I don’t know what to do when nobody’s going to walk in.”
“Me neither.”
“We’re bad at normal.”
“Apparently.”
