Page 9 of Lifeline

“I can be patient,” he said with a snort. “And don't distract me with a sibling fight over stupid shit. I’ve given you plenty of peace, quiet, and space. But now it’s time for me to address the elephant in the room…or the ex-boyfriend, if you prefer.”

“I’d prefer not to talk about any of this, actually,” I told him, but there was no one on earth who knew my brother better than me, and the reverse was true as well. I could tell on a level that felt foundational, instinctual, that I was not going to get out of the conversation. Just as he knew I didn’t have the energy to divert him from the subject. The conversation was going to happen, even if I tried to push him off or shut it down through silence.

“Man, then it’s going to really suck when I keep talking,” he said as if that was a surprise. “See, because I kinda noticed something.”

“Not your work, obviously,” I said pointedly. I might know where the conversation would inevitably end, but that didn’t mean I had to make it easy for him. “You're more focused on my love life.”

“Love life,” he repeated with a snicker. “Please, you’re almost as big a slut as Jake or Mav. You just have to go further out of town.”

“I get my needs met,” I told him.

“Your needs are very needy.”

“Hilarious.”

“Slut.”

I eyed him. “I noticed you haven’t been that worried about your needs.”

“Wow, you’re tracking whether I get laid or not?” he asked. “That’s fucking creepy.”

“You used to go out at least once a month, or at least try to go on dates. But for the past year, you haven’t,” I said, raising a brow. “Want to talk about that?”

“There’s nothing to talk about,” he said, and the flash of bewilderment across his face told me he genuinely believed what he was saying, so I let it drop. Not because I believed it, because I didn’t. Some part of me, the same one that had known how the conversation was going to go, knew there was more to the story. So either he was good at pretending otherwise for this one specific thing, or…he didn’t know the reason behind it, so there was little point in trying to push him. “You’re the one who refuses to deal with what’s wrong.”

“There’s nothing wrong.”

“I…that was a terrible lie, and you don’t normally lie.”

“I just mean, there are some things I’m…not fond of, but that doesn’t mean it needs to be talked about.”

“Pretty sure if you keep going the way you are, Xander will notice, and pretty much everyone agrees it’ll get bad if Xander catches on. You know how he can be.”

I knew how he could be, and I grimaced at the idea of our leader figuring out there was something significant going on under his nose. He could be a hardass, but despite his frequent, usually loud complaints about the ‘idiots’ he had to deal with, he was deceptively permissive of the quirks and idiosyncrasies of his crew. That said, he would never tolerate the idea that interpersonal drama from a former romantic relationship was a problem. In truth, he would probably string me up by my balls if he thought I was acting differently because my ex-boyfriend had shown up out of the blue.

There was comfort because he had been just as floored on seeing me as I had at seeing him. It was a small and cold one, but at least I knew it was the universe conspiring against me, and not him.

“I will be fine,” I told him, and while it probably sounded like a lie, or denial, it wasn’t. I would figure out how to make it work, not just for my sake, or even the team’s…but for Aidan’s. I wasn’t saying he was wrong for being upset with me, but I also wasn’t going to pretend I didn’t have a reason I had done things the way I had years ago. Of course, the reasons didn’t justify it, but…well, I would figure out a way. “It was just a surprise, and you know I don’t deal well with surprises.”

“Tell me about it,” he chuckled as he put his samples away in the temperature-controlled storage. “But I⁠—”

There was a heavy knock from the front of the building that made us both stop and look at one another in confusion. The building wasn’t private. Sure, there was a room upstairs that we, mostly me, slept in when we didn’t want to be in the main house; the rest of the building didn’t require knocking to enter.

“If that’s someone official, you need to answer the door,” he told me with a shake of his head. “The last time I talked to a suit, I thought we were going to see our funding gutted.”

“To your credit,” I said as I got to my feet. “You were off duty, not on call, and had got quite drunk with Jake and didn’t realize you were dealing with an inspector. At least he had a sense of humor.”

“I told him he had shiny eyes and his suit looked like it had been painted on.”

“Not your finest moment,” I said with a chuckle as I opened the door and froze. “Oh. Hi.”

“Hi,” Aidan said, and I couldn’t help but look him over, if only to avoid the flash of surprise and…something else in his eyes. There was still a head or so difference in height between us, and it was still just as difficult as ever to tell if he was getting much sleep or if he had just got less than usual last night. He looked…bigger, but not a whole lot, just filled out more, and yet his face was thinner. “Jake told me to drop this off, apparently he was, uh…being held hostage.”

“I see Trevor didn’t enjoy being interrupted,” I said as I took the folder from his hands. “He usually doesn’t.”

“I think it was the interruptor that was the problem, not the interruption itself,” he said, and I felt a squeeze in my chest at his tone. It was painfully familiar in the wry amusement, the voice of a man all too familiar with what it was like to be intentionally antagonistic, but accepted the punishment for being a pain in the ass with the same amusement. Or at least, that’s how it had always sounded to me. “Pretty sure Jake said he was a hostage to make Trevor sigh.”

“You used to know a thing or two about that,” I said, and then the awkwardness I was feeling was suddenly reflected on his face, and I regretted the slip.