Authors: RJ Scott
Jack pulled Hayley into a
hug and sat back on the sofa, and Eli sat opposite, watching him for signs of a
breakdown probably. Carol hovered at the door, having taken care of the twins
and Max, and the Feds sat at the table with cell phones silent and laptops
open. Robbie had left a while back; he, Vaughn, and Liam still had chores, and
horses waited for no kidnapping.
Someone gave him a whiskey,
Eden. She placed it in his hand, then resumed her seat curled up next to Jack
holding his other hand. Sean and Riley’s mom were in the kitchen making food, and
Riley’s dad was on the phone to the legal department at Hayes.
“We can get ten within an
hour,” Jim announced to the room. The Feds glanced up at him, and Carson typed
a message in on his laptop. What message he sent, Jack couldn’t even think
about. Sean came in bearing plates of food, Beth not far behind, and Jack saw
Donna, Josh, and Steve. The whole family was here.
Josh immediately crossed
to Jack and slapped a hand on his shoulder. “Anna is upstairs with the kids.
She has Lexie and Connor with Carol. She’s there if we need her.”
“Need her?” Jack looked up
at his brother blankly. What did he need? Everyone had him organized. Every
single person in this house had a reason to be here. They loved Riley, they
wanted him home, but all Jack wanted was space to be scared. No one was letting
him be scared.
Carson’s cell rang, and he
answered it immediately. He stood up abruptly, his chair clattering away from
him. “We have Riley and Tom. They’re okay.”
Jack sat up so hard he had
to catch Hayley as she slid a little.
“What?”
“Is Daddy okay?”
“What happened?”
So many questions. Carson
held up a hand, and everyone fell silent. He was smiling. “The team we had down
there has secured Riley and Tom. They’re being taken to a hospital in Nuevo
León.”
“I want Riley here, in the
US, in Dallas,” Jack said. “And Tom, I want them both here.”
Jim laid a hand on his
arm. “I’ll organize this,” he said.
And Jack was happy to let
him.
* * * * *
Riley was really beginning
to lose his shit. He was constantly being told to sleep, then woken up, then
told to sleep again. All he wanted was his family, and yet they moved him and
he swore that they were flying, that he was experiencing some kind of out of
body experience. Not since the barn fire had he felt so damn helpless. He heard
talking, efficient no-nonsense summaries of his injuries, and he even got told
that Tom was fine. But when Riley attempted to move his head, he couldn’t get a
fix on a nurse or Tom or any one of his family, or hell, indeed anything
tangible.
Every so often he had
flashes of memory, of the moment he’d pulled a trigger and killed a man, and he
felt sick, allowing sleep to pull him away to a place where he didn’t have to
think about it. The traveling, flying sensation stopped, and he opened his eyes
to a white room with a ceiling of gray squares.
“Hello there.” The voice
was soft and female. ”You’ve arrived at Dallas Mercy. How are you feeling today?”
“Where’s my family?”
“Can you tell me your
name?”
Now this was Riley
officially losing his shit. “Riley Campbell-Hayes,” he snapped. Instantly he
was contrite, but the nurse or doctor or whoever it was didn’t call him on his tone.
He was poked and prodded, and light shone in his eyes until he was ready to
snap again. “Where is Jack?”
Silence. Riley strained
his head to see who he was talking to, but all he saw was a door shutting. Then
just as quickly, it opened and he saw something that just made him want to cry.
Jack. Looking strong and solid and all his.
“Riley.” Jack crossed to
him, leaned over the bed, and held him close, talking at him about nothing and
everything, about Hayley who wanted to come in, and the twins, and Max who
didn’t understand and wasn’t that good. And how Sean helped to make sandwiches
and Riley shouldn’t be so hard on him.
“Stop!” He managed to
interrupt Jack in full flow.
“Riley?”
“Shh, just hold me.”
Jack slid hands under him
and held him, and all Riley could do was hang on and inhale the scent of his
husband. For now that was enough.
They separated a little so
that they could talk, but all Riley wanted was to look at Jack. For a time,
he’d thought he’d never see him again, and none of this there in the hospital
room seemed real.
A cough moved them apart,
but Riley gripped Jack’s hand. “Don’t leave,” he begged.
Jack squeezed his hand.
“Not going anywhere.”
“Sorry to interrupt, Mr.
Campbell-Hayes, my name is Dr. Stanlow. I just need to run through a few
things.” She flipped through a chart and nodded every so often. “Okay, so the
hospital in Nuevo León did a good job with your ankle. It’s fractured, but
we’ve set it and there shouldn’t be permanent damage. You should keep the cast
on and see your regular doctor about changing it out for a softer support.
Either way, with some PT, you should be as good as new in six to eight weeks.”
Riley flexed his legs and
put two and two together about why one felt so much heavier than the other. He
didn’t recall breaking anything. He just remembered the wound to his head.
Lifting a hand, he touched his forehead and encountered nothing but a raised
set of bumps.
She caught his movement. “We
were lucky you only needed some Steri-Strips on the cut. We’ve caught you up on
all your shots, and I’d like you to stay here one more night so I can run some
tests.”
“I’m not staying here,”
Riley said immediately.
“He’s staying,” Jack
interjected.
Riley turned his head
sharply to look at Jack and wished he hadn’t as nausea overwhelmed him. Jack held
his hair as he was embarrassingly sick in one of those stupid plastic bowls.
“One night, Riley, and I’ll
be staying with you,” he said. The doctor left, the nurse arrived to help him
clean up, and the entire time, Jack held his hand and said nothing. Only when
the nurse was gone did Jack release his hold. “I’ll get Hayley,” he said. Riley
wanted to call Jack back, he just wanted Jack. He wanted to tell him everything
about sitting in the dark and the pain and the sleeping and talking with Tom. And
the fact he’d killed a man. But when the door opened and a steady stream of visitors
descended, it was impossible to cover everything that had happened.
Hayley was in first,
climbing on him and hugging him close, Carol was at home with the twins and
Max, but there was his mom and dad, Eden, Sean, Jack’s family. Steadily he was
growing more and more tired, and words were getting hard to find. Finally it
was just Jack and Hayley, Jack on one side of his bed holding his hand and
Hayley cross-legged at the end chatting about another party she wanted to go
to.
“Were you scared, Daddy?” she
asked out of the blue.
Riley considered the
question carefully. He could be entirely honest. He could lie. Or he could just
redirect the entire thing.
“Everything happened so
fast, I didn’t have time to be scared,” he lied.
Jack squeezed his hand,
and Hayley smiled at the answer. She crawled up to kiss him good-bye, then left
to go home with Robbie who was outside the door.
“Bye, boss,” Robbie said
to Jack. “Good to have you back, Riley.” He left with Hayley, and it was just
Jack and him and the emptiness of the white room.
“I know you’re angry. You
told me not to go,” Riley began. He was sure any minute Jack was going to leap
in with an
I told you so
.
“Don’t do that,” Jack
began. He eased Riley over and managed to wriggle himself next to him on the
narrow bed. Anyone looking at the bed would not have put two grown men on it,
but somehow they managed it. “I’m not angry at you.”
Riley bit his lip. “You
have every right to be.”
Jack sighed and wriggled a
little more so that he could get an arm around Riley and pull him close. “I had
this friend once, his name was Davy, and he wanted to be in the rodeo. His mom
knew my mom, and he’d be over here at the D all the time. I was twelve, he was
maybe fifteen.”
Riley couldn’t begin to
imagine what the hell this story had to do with his and Tom’s decision to look
at a field in cartel country, but never mind, he was happy just to listen to
Jack’s voice. And at least it could delay the whole part where Jack was furious
Riley had put himself in danger.
“So we’re out on our
horses, and we’re practicing these barrel turns, like figure eights, y’know?”
Riley nodded. They’d seen
the barrel racing in the gay rodeo they’d gone to. Fast turns on horses that
got so close to the ground on the turn Riley couldn’t watch.
“We were competitive, we
both wanted to be the best, but his horse went right out from under him and
crushed his legs. His mom was screaming at me, crying in the hospital, the fall
had damaged his spine, you see, and there was no way he’d ever be in a rodeo.
Hell, it was odds-on he wouldn’t walk again. But he did walk again, and the
last I saw him was when he moved to Montana.”
Riley waited for the
connection. There had to be one. This was typical Jack to have some kind of
morality tale that made sense.
“I remember what his dad
was saying. Telling his mom that their son was only doing what was right at the
time. He was a good rider, took precautions, it was in his blood, he couldn’t
know that it would go wrong that day. Same as you. Yeah, I worried, and I said
what I thought, but you could have gone down there, all that protection from
the government, and been fine. Just bad luck, Riley, bad luck is all.”
Riley closed his eyes and
focused on his breathing. “You always say the right thing,” he murmured.
Jack chuckled. “I try.”
“I hate you,” Riley
snarked.
“I love you too.”
* * * * *
The journey back to the D
was made in Riley’s SUV.
“It’s got the best
suspension.” Jack defended the choice. Riley couldn’t muster up the energy to
quip back. He was way past talking and well on his way to just sleeping. They
were out of Dallas traffic quickly, and Riley settled back in his seat. Jack
kept up a general level of conversation, telling Riley things he had missed and
quite a bit about how the decision to take on Vaughn at the D was a good thing.
Jack joined the back of slow-moving
traffic as they hit the interstate, and Riley realized he was gripping hard to
the door handle. He was thankful the car automatically locked when the engine
started. Jack cursed when someone cut them off and again when he had to press
the brakes sharply to avoid rear ending an idiot in a Subaru.
Riley heard himself whimper
but hoped to hell Jack hadn’t. He had every right to be jumpy, but Jack didn’t
need to know about it.
When they finally made it
back to the D, Riley was never more pleased to see his own bed or to hold the
twins or to play Thomas with Max. Hayley was fetching and carrying for him, her
sunny outlook on life a balm on Riley’s confusion. When they went to bed, Jack
held him like he was made of glass. And that was okay, because Riley didn’t
think he could ever be anything else than cold and desperate for touch.
Stupid. Give it a few
days.
“You know what we need,”
Riley said softly as they drifted toward sleep.
“What?”
“Maybe some more security
here.”
Jack hummed his agreement
and shifted a little to gather Riley closer. “I’ll look after you,” he said. “I
love you.”
“I love you too.”
“I thought I’d lost you,”
Jack added, and his tone was bleaker.
“I thought I was lost,”
Riley said. Those words were the most he could offer. When Tom had walked into
his hospital room to say he’d been discharged, a scowling boyfriend—
Michael?
—at
his side, he’d said he’d see Riley at work soon.
Riley closed his eyes and
settled his breathing to match Jack’s.
Probably be a good idea to
think about working from home. It’s safe here.
Jack worked from one end
and Vaughn the other, and they met in the middle where Robbie had marked out
the boundary of the first riding area. The white uprights looked clean, and all
they needed to do now was attach the railings. Robbie worked his way around,
testing each upright, and finally all three men were standing in the middle of
the ring and contemplating what came next.
“I’ll get the next one
marked out,” Robbie announced.
“I’ll start on the
fencing,” Vaughn added.
“Anything I can do?” Liam
asked from behind Jack.
Jack turned on his heel. “Can
you work with Vaughn?” Liam jogged over to catch up with Vaughn and heft the
first of the lengths of white wood that would create the last past of the
perimeter.
“Delivery!” Carol called
from the side, the twins in a double stroller. She would walk them out each day
for air, and it never failed to make Jack smile to see them. Riley had been out
of the hospital a week now, and part of Jack wished his husband would also come
out and see the work they’d done on the school arenas. Seemed like Riley was
hiding in work, with every sentence he spoke starting with Tom’s name or
talking about shale and gas and oil and data.
Jack glanced over at the start
of a separate barn, which he’d had farmed out to a specialty construction
company to build. For a moment he concentrated on that and not on Riley. The
barn was all on one level, no stairs to negotiate apart from a small storage
space in the eaves. The stalls were wide and the paths in between stalls and riding
area smooth. There was even a room set out like a classroom for the care side
of the school, learning about horses. Eli was in there today decking it out,
although Jack hadn’t seen what he’d done yet. The delivery today was the last
part of the building jigsaw—the hoist they’d need for any of the kids who
couldn’t get themselves on to the horses on their own.
Since the trial in Laredo,
he’d had something else on his mind: the kids who had no where to go, the ones
who’d ended up with Hank. He’d checked up on all of them, and they were all at
different stages in their lives. They all seemed to be at crossroads of their
own, and Jack had put things in place to help them.
If only it was so easy to
help Riley.
“Back in ten,” Jack called
over to Robbie, who waved in acknowledgment. Then climbing Solo Cal, he made
his way back to the house. The school and house were a few minutes apart by
horse, maybe ten at a walk, and as he used the new road being created in the
dirt, he felt another wave of pride for what the D would be doing. When he
arrived at the house, he found a truck with the hoist and two drivers talking
to Riley. The one who appeared in charge turned to face Jack as Riley indicated
with his hand that was who they should be talking to. Before Jack could
dismount, Riley was hobbling back into the house on his crutches. Riley didn’t
even wait to say hello or shoot the breeze or, hell, give Jack a kiss.
Tom’s car was here, which
meant the two of them were inside working, but Jack couldn’t help feeling that
things were terribly wrong with Riley. Not only had he not visited the school,
he’d spent so much time in his office it was a wonder he didn’t grow roots into
the floor. Jack filed away the concern and focused on the hoist; they needed it
in place now, and Riley was something he could deal with after. Anything to
give himself more thinking time.
“Can you follow me to the
school itself?”
The guys agreed, and Jack
didn’t have much time to think about Riley as he concentrated on the hoist being
placed exactly where it needed to be.
By the time they’d all
finished for the day, the fence was up on the first riding area, the hoist was
in place, and Jack had checked in on the classroom part. Eli had done this
whole horse theme, and Jack had to admit Eli had an eye for what looked good. Each
child at the riding lessons had to have a commitment to learning something
about horse care to whatever level they could manage. There were ramps
everywhere, and Eli was creating a small sensory quiet space off the barn just
for kids like Max who sometimes got overwhelmed. There was even a small medical
area with a bed.
Dinner was quiet. The
twins were sleeping, Hayley was studying, and Max was looking at a Thomas
picture book with his headphones in. Carol had her night off and had left in
her car a few hours back, which meant Riley and Jack had each other. Riley even
seemed like his old self; he was quiet, yes, but he looked relaxed and he was
managing to hobble around the kitchen on his crutches way better than when he’d
first come home.
The cut on his forehead
didn’t look quite as angry as it did when it was scarlet and puffy, and his
skin had lost that gray tinge it had in hospital.
“Saw Tom was here again
today,” Jack observed, more for something to say than anything else.
“We have reports to file
on the soil samples from the second site,” Riley answered immediately. He
sounded defensive, and Jack had the impression Riley had been waiting for him
to question Tom’s being there. Did Riley think Jack was jealous of Tom? Why
would Riley even look at Tom when he and Riley had each other?
“Good, glad it’s going
well,” Jack offered, even though he realized it was quite a lame thing to say.
They cleared the kitchen
together, despite Riley cursing when he twisted his leg on water on the floor. When
Hayley and Max were both asleep, Jack followed Riley into their bedroom. He
refused to believe it when he felt Riley attempt to tug his hand free.
Riley
wouldn’t do that.
Jack closed the door and leaned against the wood, and
that was when it happened.
When he realized that
Riley couldn’t look him in the eyes. That Riley was actually looking at every point
in the room except Jack.
“What’s wrong?” Jack
asked. A million thoughts ran through his head. Had Riley been hurt worse than he
was letting on?
“Nothing,” Riley said.
Jack could see the lie. He knew Riley so well he could see the subtle shrug of
his shoulders and the closed expression on his face, and he knew Riley was
hiding something.
“Something’s wrong.”
“Nothing’s wrong. Fuck’s sake,
Jack.” And there it was: the flash of anger when Jack pushed Riley. Another one
of Riley’s defense mechanisms. “I was kidnapped and my fucking ankle hurts.
Okay!”
Jack held up his hands. “I’m
not here to fight with you. I’m here for you.”
Riley opened his mouth to
say something, then shut it just as quickly. He limped with his crutches to the
closet and pulled out a thin jacket, shrugging it on. “I’m going out for air,”
he said to the closet. Not to Jack, but to the
damn hangers
. Jack set
himself firmly against the door and crossed his arms over his chest.
“Talk to me, Riley.”
“I just need to get some
air,” Riley replied. He stepped close to Jack and waited expectantly.
“No, Riley. Something is seriously
wrong here, and you know it.”
“Tom said you’d be like
this,” Riley blurted out, “telling me how I feel.” He deflated, like all the
energy was flooding out of him.
Despair knotted in Jack’s
chest. Were Riley and Tom… They had shared an experience. What if…? Jack’s
entire world cracked in a second, and he couldn’t even begin to contemplate
what was spinning in his head.
“Did you…? I… Are you and
Tom…?”
Riley stared at him, which,
to be fair, was the first time they’d met eye to eye in a couple days. Jack
couldn’t believe Riley’s eyes shone with tears, and, in horror, he watched as a
single tear rolled down Riley’s face, then his husband buckled and just fell to
the floor in a heap and mess of uncoordinated limbs with a cry of pain as his
leg caught under him. At first, Jack thought he’d collapsed, but then Riley
looked up at him.
“No. I wouldn’t,” he
began.
Jack was instantly at his
side, crouched next to him. This wasn’t a man about to announce he was seeing
someone else. Riley looked broken. Jack held him close.
“Talk to me, Riley.
Please.”
“Tom was there. He understands.
But he said you might not understand. He tried to explain it to me.”
“Tell me what happened. I’ll
understand if you tell me,” Jack said. He was at a loss of what else to say.
“Tom saw what they were
doing. I… Jack… I had a gun… I shot a man. He had a mask… He was going to kill
us, and I just pointed the gun at him and… He was dead.”
Riley looked right at Jack,
and there was a desperation in his eyes. Riley had shot someone? That hadn’t
been in any of the reports, and how did Riley manage to keep something like
that a secret from Jack for so long? Jack didn’t have to stop and think about
his reaction.
“You had to,” he said immediately.
That had to have been it. Someone was threatening Riley, and all Riley had done
was defend himself.
“I didn’t even think about
it, I just pulled the trigger. He was going to hurt us, and it was so easy and
quick.”
“You had to,” Jack
repeated. “Otherwise he would have hurt you and Tom, am I right?”
Riley gripped Jack’s arm.
“You think this is how Lisa felt after she shot Jeff?”
Jack couldn’t help
himself, temper gripped him and he stood abruptly, bringing Riley with him and
stumbling at the extra weight. The two of them tilted, and Jack fell back
against the wall, Riley slamming into him. Even that wasn’t enough to still the
anger. He loosened Riley’s hold on his arm and cradled his face. Riley’s hazel
eyes, still bright with emotion, betrayed how he felt.
“Don’t you ever say
something like that again. You didn’t deliberately shoot that person; he was
trying to kill you.”
“It’s still murder.”
“And what about Bryan?
What about the other guys in your security detail? They were dead; did you want
to give up and lay dead in the dirt as well?”
Riley’s eyes widened. “Of
course I don’t.”
Jack pressed his forehead
against Riley’s. “Then let’s talk about how you were defending yourself, about what
happened, and think on what’s next. Okay?” Relief flooded Jack; this he could
handle.
Jack pulled on a jacket of
his own. He had to get air, and the two of them needed to be outside. He opened
the door, then allowed Riley through first and watched as he made his way out
on the crutches. Together they passed through the darkened kitchen and out the
door into the front yard.
“We should get a porch,”
Jack muttered. “With chairs.”
“We’ll add one.”
Jack considered his
options. He felt the need to lean on something, and they crossed to the first
fence. Jack hoisted himself to sit up, and Riley instinctively moved to stand
between his legs. The crescent moon cast enough light so that they could easily
see each other, but it was too dark to see the emotions in Riley’s expressive
eyes. Jack would have to rely on all the other little cues that Riley gave, the
tone of his voice, the way he stood…
Out here under the vast
sky, Jack listened to the man he loved as he talked in detail about what he’d
done and what had been done to him. And Jack held him so close there was no gap
between them. Riley cried. Out there where none of the kids could hear him,
where his family wasn’t a witness, where only Jack was there to see,
Riley
cried.
And every tear broke
Jack’s heart.
* * * * *
They went to bed, and
Riley seemed lighter, as if a great weight had lifted.
“We talked about you when
I was in that place with Tom…”
“All good things, I hope.”
“Told him all about how I
was a bastard and you fell for me anyway.” Riley turned on his side, and Jack
spooned him from behind. The clock showed it was midnight, and Jack was beyond
tired and on to exhausted. He smiled against Riley’s skin.
“Not a complete bastard,”
Jack said. “You had redeeming qualities.”
Riley yawned and snuggled
back. This was Jack’s favorite time with Riley all sleepy and both of them
talking softly in the privacy of their own room.
“What qualities were
they?” Riley sounded disbelieving.
“You were very tall,” Jack
deadpanned. Riley elbowed his arm. “What? I like tall men.”
“What else?” Riley asked.
Sleep edged his tone, and Jack knew it wouldn’t be long before Riley was
asleep.
“Your eyes, all crazy
brown and green and gorgeous. And your family, they were a winning extra to
your weird self. Apart from Eden,” Jack laughed. “She was way too normal. Then
there was the money, I mean you had loads of it, and you had a plane…” He trailed
off as he realized Riley had succumbed and was sleeping, his breathing deep and
even.
Jack pressed a kiss to
Riley’s warm skin, pulled the covers up over their shoulders, and relaxed.
Tonight had been a roller coaster of emotions, but Riley was here and he was
alive. Jack could support Riley getting out the other side of this.
But the thought of losing
Riley to another man…