Chapter Six

  Seattle’s ridiculous traffic bought us some time. The bridges across the lake were congested as they always were and would be until later in the morning. I drove north and took the highway instead of the freeway; more traffic lights and a lower speed limit, but fewer cars crawling bumper-to-bumper at three miles an hour.

  We grabbed coffee at one of the drive-through huts, and as we sat at a stoplight in Kenmore, Julien stared out the passenger-side window. He kept popping the lid on and off his cup, then spinning it, then popping it on and off again. That was typical Joshua. He didn’t handle nerves well, and it was impossible for his hands to stay idle when he was nervous. He was the kid who always caught hell for tapping pencils, playing with erasers and drumming his fingers. At least he’d gotten over the habit of chewing on stuff. He’d bitten into the metal end of a pencil during seminary one morning while he was nervous about a wrestling meet and cracked a tooth. That was the end of that habit.

  But his hands still fidgeted. I wondered if he was like that when he was out in the field with the Legion. If they ever had to sit for any length of time in the middle of the desert, he’d probably have started drawing shit in the sand with a stick or his fingers.

  The mental image made me chuckle, and Julien glanced at me. “What?”

  I shook my head and rested my hand on top of the wheel. “Nothing.”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  I turned to him, and skepticism was written across his face. Facing forward again, I said, “I was just thinking about”—I gestured at his hands and coffee cup— “how you used to play with everything in school and at seminary.”

  He looked down, and this time he laughed a little. “Old habits die hard, I guess.”

  “I imagine they do. How are you holding up?”

  Julien blew out a breath. He shoved the coffee cup into the cup holder and folded his hands in his lap, but that lasted about two seconds before he put his arm on the door and started running his finger back and forth below the window. “Just not sure what to expect.”

  “Deb didn’t say anything?”

  “She said Mom’s in shock. She hasn’t really responded much at all.” He went from running his finger back and forth to tapping his nail with a rapidfire click-click-click. “From the sound of it, Mom was just so blown away last night, she didn’t say anything, but then she called Deb at the crack of dawn and pretty much begged to see me.” He turned his head, focusing on something outside the window. “Deb can’t tell if she’s angry, relieved or anything. She just wants to see me. Now.”

  “She might be angry at first. I was. But the shock will wear off.” I hope. “I honestly can’t imagine your mom turning you away. Not after how hard she took—” I cut myself off, but not before Julien visibly flinched. Without thinking about it, I reached for his hand and squeezed it. “She’s your mother.”

  Julien didn’t speak, and he didn’t look at me, but he separated his fingers and laced them between mine.

  I didn’t let go. Neither did he.

  And damn, this was inappropriate, but I couldn’t help noticing the callouses, the strength, the boniness of his fingers, and part of me wanted to take his hand and make him touch me. Anywhere, really. Maybe I wanted to compare what he felt like now, compare that to the nervous fumbling that still broke my heart a bit when I remembered it. Lacing our fingers together like this reminded me of sex, where I was far more likely to touch somebody like that. Throes of passion, yadda, yadda, yadda. At a red light, I pulled his hand a bit closer and briefly touched it with my other hand too.

  And I shouldn’t even be thinking this, but I was. Which made trying to be just a friend and offer moral support doubly hard. Maybe I should work harder to resolve everything. Though we were making progress. And his family was more important.

  We pulled up outside the door—perfectly nice neighborhood, their house substantial but not ostentatious, despite the fact that the family had quite a bit of wealth. Everything was silent when we got out of the car, apart from a light-footed runner jogging along the street, sneakers touching the ground softly, and a mutt running along, claws ticking on the concrete. The two old trees flanking the Hawthorne’s house rustled in the light wind.

  Julien straightened and looked at the house, eyes a touch too wide, betraying his nerves. I could imagine him facing combat much more calmly than this. Lie. I couldn’t really imagine him in combat. I didn’t want to.

  I touched him between the shoulder blades. “You’ll be fine. I’ll be there.” Maybe I said something more to that effect. Empty platitudes. At least I left God out of it. That would have been different six years ago.

  He straightened a little, gave me a tentative smile, barely more than a labored smirk, and stepped into the road. I made sure there were no cars coming—he did look awfully distracted—but no cars were out. Early Saturday morning. People were still turning around for five more minutes in their beds.

  The kitchen curtain twitched. I saw a shadow moving.

  So did he, because his steps faltered for a moment.

  I drew a bit closer, touched his arm again.

  So yeah, I liked touching him. Big deal.

  He hadn’t reached the doorbell when the door opened, and his mother stood there.

  Well, I’d had a rough night, but she looked worse. Gray-faced, worn, aged five or even ten years since I’d seen her last at the baptism of Deb’s youngest. Her eyes widened, and her hand went up to her mouth, and after a moment, that gesture turned into reaching out to him. I stepped away, because suddenly there was no space for me, as she pulled him closer, cupped his cheek, pulled him into an embrace. He seemed almost helpless for maybe ten seconds, then closed his arms ever so gently around his mother. I blinked a few times, still worried she’d push him away or chastise him, but then all that tension just bled away, and I heard them sniffle.

  “Come, come on in,” she said, voice raw and so soft. Damn, I didn’t really do family, not anymore, but this was about as much as I could bear. Surely, everything would be all right now. Whatever the old man said or thought or however he’d respond, this felt like half that particular battle was won.

  Julien glanced at me, eyes wet and red, and smiled a little. I returned it and followed him and his mother into the house.

  Deb was in the foyer, standing just to the side, and when she looked at me, she gave a relieved sigh.

  The four of us walked in silence into the living room. Deb and I took the chairs on either side of the sofa, and Julien and his mother sat on the sofa. They kept some space between them, but a lot less than I’d expected. She kept a hand on his arm, probably just to be sure he was real, that this wasn’t a vision or a ghost, but her flesh-and-blood son.

  For the longest time, no one spoke. She stared at him—sometimes his face, sometimes his hand, sometimes just looking him over as if to make sure he wasn’t injured or starting to fade away into thin air—and he watched her as creases of apprehension formed on his forehead.

  A good five minutes must have passed before his mother simply whispered, “Joshua.”

  He didn’t flinch at his prior name, and smiled. “It’s me, Mom. I’m home.” The French accent was almost completely gone just then, but he spoke more slowly than normal, as if it was a struggle to form the words at all, never mind without the accent he’d developed since his “death”.

  Still grasping his hand, she reached for his face again with the other. She cupped his cheek, touched his short hair, traced his features like a blind woman trying to make out who was in front of her. “It is you.”

  “Yes, it is.” He swallowed hard. “I’m sorry, Mom. I didn’t—”

  She hugged him again. With far more strength than a woman that frail should have possessed, she embraced him and held him tight. “Thank the Lord,” she whispered. “My prayers have been answered.”

  I winced. Julien just hugged his mother tight and didn’t make a sound.

  She stroked his hair and looked up, and the way her eyes filled with tears and she smiled, I couldn’t help getting choked up. She really believed God had brought her son home to her. No matter where Joshua had gone or why, God had brought him home. Six years ago, I’d have been right there with her, thanking the Heavenly Father for the miraculous return of someone we’d all believed lost. Not now. For the first time in a long time, I felt that emptiness where my faith had once been.

  As she let him go, she wiped her eyes. “I don’t care where you’ve been, Joshua. What you’ve done. Why. Any of it. I only want my son back.”

  Julien’s lips tightened, and he lowered his gaze, watching his thumb trace a seam in the cushion between them. “I’m not the same person I was back then.”

  “You’re my son.” She took his hand, halting his thumb’s exploration of that seam. “You’re my son, you’re alive, and you’re home.” Shaking her head, she added, “That’s all I’ve ever wanted, Joshua.”

  This time, his given name did make him wince slightly. Watching him now, seeing the discomfort and the struggle he was obviously trying to keep under the surface, I realized she had no idea how right he was. He wasn’t the same person. Julien was more than a name change. Julien was the man Joshua had become after he’d thrown off the person he’d had no choice but to become, and that person he’d thrown off was the one his mother believed had returned.

  But that Joshua, I realized, had died a long time ago.

  He smiled, and my God, it looked forced. “It’s good to be home, Mom. Do you think Dad will want to see me?”

  “Of course he will.” She smiled too, some fresh tears in her eyes. “He’s been in the hospital the last couple of nights. We can visit him there.”

  Julien straightened. “In the hospital?” He glanced at his sister, then back at his mother, eyes wide with alarm. “How bad is—”

  “He’s fine, sweetheart. Just had a little scare the other day, and they wanted to keep him a few extra days to be on the safe side.”

  “Oh.” Julien relaxed a little, but some of the tension lingered. “I guess you’ll want to tell him first. Break the news gently instead of having me surprise him.”

  His mother nodded. “I’ll go see him this afternoon. Then we can go together tomorrow.”

  Julien gulped but then nodded too. “Sure. Yeah.” He glanced at me. “Tomorrow.”

  Fuck. I didn’t know how much more of this I could handle. He must have been on the verge of crumbling under it all.

  But I nodded. Yes, I’ll go with you.

  He smiled. Thank you.

  Chapter Seven

  We stayed with Julien’s mother until lunchtime. Then she was due to visit her husband, which gave us a convenient excuse to get the hell out of there.

  It hadn’t been an unpleasant visit. It had gone a lot better than I’d anticipated, probably much better than Julien had thought it would. But it was just so…fraught. Tense. Four people in one room with five years’ worth of grief, loss, anger and old wounds that had been ripped open and healed all at once. The last time I’d been this emotionally exhausted was, appropriately, after I’d learned of Joshua’s death.

  Apparently I wasn’t the only one. Julien had barely seemed able to walk back out to the car, and by the time I’d pulled up to the stoplight at the end of the development, he was asleep, and he stayed that way until I’d parked at the foot of my apartment building.

  I touched his arm. “Hey.”

  He jumped, instantly wide awake.

  “Easy. We’re back at the apartment.”

  He blinked a few times and looked around, then rubbed his eyes. “I really slept the whole way home?”

  “Yeah.” I grinned. “And you snored the entire way, just like old times.”

  “Shut up,” he said with a laugh as he unbuckled his seat belt. “Isn’t like you’re a silent sleeper or anything.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  We got out of the car and headed upstairs. As I unlocked the front door, all the stress from earlier seemed to catch up with Julien. His shoulders slumped. His eyes were exhausted. The minute he found a flat surface, he’d probably be out cold again. There was no need to ask if he was okay. He was obviously not.

  “You want something to drink?” I asked as we went inside. “I’ve got a bottle or two of some strong shit.”

  “Yeah? Like what?”

  I turned the dead bolt behind me. “Jim Beam. Johnnie Walker. I might even have some Cuervo left.”

  “You like the good stuff, eh?”

  “Working at Wilde’s has turned me into a booze snob.” I gestured at the kitchen. “I could go for some Johnnie.”

  Julien nodded. “I’ll have what you’re having.”

  I pulled down a couple of glasses and the bottle of Johnnie Walker. Blue label, of course. Rent was tight sometimes, but this bartender did not skimp when it came to alcohol. I poured it over some ice and handed him a glass.

  He sipped it and barely grimaced. Obviously Mr. Super Mormon had long ago left behind the alcohol abstinence that had been drilled into our heads since birth.

  I took a sip of my own. Absently swirling it, I said, “So how are you holding up?”

  Julien stared into his glass. “I don’t know. I feel like I should feel something.” Then he threw back the drink like a shot and put it down hard enough to make me jump. Meeting my eyes, he said, “I don’t feel a damned thing.”

  I swallowed. I could change that for you in a big hurry. But I sought refuge in my drink, watching it splash against the ice cubes and the inside of the glass as I swirled it like he’d done.

  “Chris.”

  I looked up and almost dropped the glass. When had he come closer? How in the world were we no longer that far apart?

  I hadn’t noticed the rattling noise, and it stopped only when Julien closed his hand around mine, stilling the shaking so the ice was no longer hitting the glass. Eyes locked on mine, he gently freed the glass, then reached past me to set it on the counter.

  I couldn’t breathe, and his words kept rattling around in my head like the ice had done in my glass: “I feel like I should feel something. I don’t feel a damned thing.”

  I feel a lot of things right now, Julien. Numb isn’t one of them.

  He got the message. We’d almost grown up together, so he knew me. He still knew me. Maybe I hadn’t really changed. Or whatever we’d had hadn’t been screwed up or destroyed. Maybe it had just grown up with us. I moved a bit closer, brushed him. He closed the rest of the distance.

  Taste of alcohol. His mouth was cool and fiery from the ice and the alcohol, and that sensation raced down all the way to my cock. I opened up immediately, even before the thought, What are we doing, is this the right time, should we make things even more complicated, could raise its head fully. I really didn’t care. Couldn’t care. All I knew was that I was desperate to get to know him again. The new one, Julien, who was the man my friend Joshua had chosen to be. His true self. So this was really a first, wasn’t it?

  I pushed against him, and he took a step back, though I didn’t think it was anything but surprise. Still, I pressed the advantage I had and pushed him against the nearest wall. He took over though, green eyes sparking—half amusement, half challenge—as he pushed me against the opposite wall.

  I was already lost. Lost to reason, lost to my grudges, lost to everything but the sensation of stubble against stubble, skin against skin, groin against groin. Full-body contact. Before I knew it, my hands were pulling at his clothes, and his were sliding under my T-shirt, tracing pure electricity over my skin. I’d lose my mind. No doubt. I’d just lose my mind and fuck him right here and now.

  Julien grabbed my hair and pulled my head back, and before I could recover from that delicious shock, his lips and stubble were against my neck. He kissed his way up and down my throat, all the way to the underside of my jaw and back down to just above my collar, lips soft and chin rough and breath hot.

  “Oh my God,” I moaned, feeling blindly for the wall. When I found it, I leaned against it, hoping my knees didn’t shake out from under me. There was no stopping now. Not a fucking chance. All the tension from the last twenty-four hours—especially the last several hours—concentrated itself between us as he kissed my neck and I ground against him, desperate to get closer to each other and break all this tension. He wanted to feel something, didn’t he?

  I shoved him back. He stumbled once, stared at me in surprise, but then I pulled off my shirt, and he grinned and took off his own. When he reached for me again, he grabbed my belt, using it to pull me back to him even as he was unbuckling it.

  “I need this so bad,” he murmured between kisses. My belt jingled, but only briefly before our hips came together again and muted it. “Chris, we… Fuck…”

  “‘Fuck’ sounds like a good idea.” I panted against his lips and struggled with his belt, especially since he was pressed against me and his cock was rock hard beneath his jeans and my hands. “Now. Fuck me now.”

  He released the most amazing, helpless groan and claimed another deep kiss. Then, “We need…the…” He said something in French. Cursing, maybe?

  “Lube. We need lube.”

  “Yes. That. And condoms.”

  “Lube. The rest… It’s you. I don’t care.”

  Sliding his hand over the front of my pants, squeezing just hard enough to make my breath catch, he said, “Condoms.”

  I was in no mood to argue. Besides, I had both. I grabbed his wrist. “Bedroom.”

  We practically sprinted down the hallway—as much as we could when we were both this hard, anyway—and I pulled open the nightstand drawer so fast I almost yanked it free. Condoms, check. Lube, check.

  And Julien, pressed against me from behind, his dick against my ass and his lips on my neck? Check. Oh God, check.

  His hand slid around the front of my throat, something that would have unnerved me with anyone else, but not with him. He lifted my chin, turned my head and kissed up and down my neck as his other hand drifted down my abs. My belt was already unbuckled, so he unbuttoned and unzipped my jeans.