Pack of Lies, page 24
Julien shook his head and his whole body twitched from a particularly intense shiver. “I ran all over yelling for him and no one even noticed. The music was so loud, and I couldn’t find Mom or Skip anywhere, and I kept coming back to the porch and staring at the hammock again and again. Like if I could just restart enough times, keep coming out to check on him, eventually he’d still be there sleeping. You don’t think very clearly with that sort of panic. It’s like looking down and realizing your own body is gone, or that falling feeling right before sleep. It’s what dying feels like, I think. Christ, it’s freezing in here, isn’t it? I mean, it’s not just me, right?”
Eli blinked at the abrupt shift in topic. “Did you find him?”
“Oh, yeah. I spotted him in the ocean eventually. Getting pulled out by the tide. I thought he was dead, you know, just bobbing up and down in the darkness like that. I ran out and scooped him up, and of course he immediately starts fighting me. Telling me I’d ruined everything. That the mermaids had been about to take him away to live with them and all I could think was And then what? Would you have really just left me here for them? Alone? Without even saying goodbye?”
He laughed. “I guess that’s pretty stupid. I mean, he was five years old, what kind of complex empathy was I expecting? But the thing about Rocky is he never really changed. He was so...single-minded. Nothing was ever more important than proving he was right. Than experiencing something spectacular even if it meant leaving everyone else behind to pick up the pieces.”
Julien blew out a breath that Eli could see like a plume of smoke. “I want to believe he didn’t say anything about Ian’s body because he knew it would prove he’d been there, but the truth is he probably hadn’t seen Ian as anything more than a prop bit in his own story. Ian was past helping, so what would be the point? A murder investigation would have just gotten in his way. Ruined everything. I’m sure he thought I would have, too, if he told me. Just like I always did. And he was right. The last time we spoke I hung up on him. I told him I was done bailing him out, hung up and that’s why I wasn’t there to pull him back out of the water. Jesus, are you sure you’re not cold?” Julien asked, voice shaking. “Because I feel like I’m going to die over here.”
Eli moved across the floor to sit beside him and Julien went very still. Or as still as someone could while shivering that much, his wide eyes eerily dark in his too-pale face. Eli took off his coat and pushed it into Julien’s hands a bit roughly. “Here.”
“You’ll freeze,” he protested.
“No. I won’t.” Eli deliberately flashed his eyes and refused to look away.
This time Julien didn’t flinch. He just tilted his head slightly, studying Eli with only a tinge of wonder, then slowly put the coat on over his own. “Thank you.”
“I suppose you’ve already been told it’s not your fault.”
Julien jerked his head, giving that the dismissal it deserved.
“I’m sorry your brother died. No matter how it happened.”
“Yes,” Julien said. “You see, I’ve done this part already, though. Unpacking the guilt and the grief. The anger. I have a therapist and a psychiatrist and a grief counselor. I have family and friends and two ex-wives who check in on me every other week. I’m extremely lucky. But every time I close my eyes it’s like coming out to that empty hammock again. And every single night I feel like I’m falling and everything in me is just screaming do something. I actually thought by coming here, I finally was. I’m so sorry.”
“Why?”
“For dragging you into this mess with me. For lying and using you.”
“If it meant finding out what happened to your brother, would you do it again?” Julien was silent and Eli shrugged. “So then don’t be sorry. I would have done the same thing for someone I loved.” If it had been his own family, sister or pack, he’d have done a lot worse. In fact, once upon a time he had.
Julien shook his head as if frustrated. “I made you feel bad. Can I be sorry for that?”
Eli’s heart twisted painfully and he didn’t know why. Maybe apologies were too close to pity. Maybe something else. “If you truly have nothing better to do,” he said in his most pronounced drawl. “Besides, you were wrong before. You didn’t drag me into a single thing. I needed to figure out what’s going on, too.”
“Because the De Lucas are a...rival pack? And they’re using this as an excuse to take away your retreat?” Julien asked. “Which is actually a haven for...?”
“Let’s not add to the list of reasons why I’m going to be in trouble with the cabal, as you put it.”
“I thought it didn’t matter that I know.”
“Not for you. But don’t let this delightful countenance fool you, I’m not universally beloved. Or did you think all wolves live in near-complete isolation under false identities?”
Julien’s frowned, so maybe he had. “Who told you about me? That’s what you said when I first woke up. Not who told you about werewolves. But about you specifically. Are you in danger?”
“I’m trapped in a tower with a man I can’t trust while an armed gunman waits outside getting, we can only assume, increasingly desperate. I’ve felt safer.”
“But with the cabal or what—whatever. The group of werewolves Nielsen was afraid would steal his work. Do they...not like you either?”
“Nielsen died years ago. Things have changed,” Eli evaded.
“I know there’s no point saying you can trust me, so I won’t,” Julien said after a long moment. “But I do promise I won’t tell them anything. I won’t tell anyone anything about you.”
Eli shook his head. “While I appreciate the drama of declaring one’s loyalty in the eleventh hour, let’s not make promises we can’t keep, hmm? You have your priorities and I have mine. Fortunately, those both require living through the night so for now, in here, we’re on the same side.”
“And after that?” Julien asked. “When we leave the tower?”
“Out there this ceasefire comes to an end and we may trust each other as much as we ever did.”
Or ever should have, as the case may be.
Chapter Twelve
It was beginning to feel like the longest night of Julien’s life. Considering his insomnia, that was saying something. The only positive was he was so freezing and miserable and bored it was difficult to fixate on the killer outside. Guns were a problem of the abstract future. The cold so intense he was straining muscles with the effort not to inch closer to Eli’s substantial heat was a problem happening very much now.
What he should really be focusing on was the whole werewolf thing. But it had been so long since Julien had allowed himself to even think the word, for fear of the memory of Rocky’s excited voice that came with it, that it was almost impossible to break the habit now.
But they’re not human, Juley. Inside they’re wolves. For real this time.
Of course, if he’d spent less time avoiding and more time thinking things all the way through, maybe he could have avoided these endless empty hours of shivering on the floor in uncomfortable silence, replaying the exact way Eli’s voice had cracked when he’d said you haven’t hurt me, and the fear in his eyes when he’d crawled across the floor to give Julien his coat. Why? What was he afraid of?
And there he went again. Werewolves. Werewolves were real. The most astonishing thing to ever happen and all Julien could keep thinking about was Eli.
Julien opened his eyes and found the man himself staring at him, practically nose to nose. Julien realized he’d shifted closer without thinking about it.
“Sorry,” he whispered, and scooched away again. “I’m just—You’re really not cold?”
Julien had both their coats wrapped around his body while Eli was still in the same sweater as before. He hadn’t even taken it off as a—when the—when he’d turned into a wolf. Julien wondered if that’s why he wore such loose-fitting clothes. Maybe he got special outfits tailored for exactly that reason. He imagined the huge black wolf from before wearing a tuxedo and snorted.
Eli frowned. “You may be in shock.”
“I can’t think of a single reason why,” Julien said, closing his eyes. He felt disconnected and dreamy but couldn’t tell if it was because everything happening seemed so unreal or if it was the grogginess of night after night without sleep.
A warm hand pressed against his forehead and Julien opened his eyes again eagerly. Sure enough, Eli was feeling around his face almost tenderly.
“You don’t smell well,” he said after a moment, which sort of put a damper on that. “And I was referring to medical shock. You bled on me quite a bit when I was carrying you here.”
“Sorry,” Julien said, and Eli’s frown deepened. He took his hand away and Julien couldn’t stop the whimper at even that small loss of heat.
Eli made a disapproving sound and closed the distance between them until they were sharing air again and Julien could feel the fringes of his body heat. But still he avoided touching him.
Julien tucked his face into his coat’s hood in an attempt to warm his nose and was immediately overwhelmed by the scents of Eli. Or at least his shampoo. Something like roses and expensive furs and—Julien sniffed—apricots?
He heard a choking sound and when he turned to look the expression on Eli’s face was oddly intense and his eyes were doing that glowing thing again.
“What’s wrong?”
Eli cleared his throat. “How does your arm feel?”
“Not bad,” Julien said honestly. “Sort of numb.” Then the rest of Eli’s words caught up to him. “You carried me here?”
“I did mention it before. Were you under the impression you sleepwalked?”
“No, I—to be fair there was a lot to process at the time. That part slipped through the cracks,” Julien said. His cheeks were making a valiant attempt at heating, which resulted in a tingle more than anything else. He felt odd. Not embarrassed exactly, but...shy? And something else, too, that he couldn’t quite pin down. “I haven’t been picked up since—”
Childhood presumably. But even that seemed unfamiliar. Honey had been especially delicate back then and it was difficult to imagine her holding anything bigger than a two-year-old, though surely she must have sometime or another.
“I don’t know when,” he finished awkwardly. “I must have looked ridiculous flopping around, flung over your shoulder like a big useless lump.”
Eli’s expression turned abruptly wary. “That upsets you,” he said flatly.
“Not upsetting, exactly,” Julien said.
“Does it bother you that even when I was on my knees I could have overpowered you anytime I wanted?”
“What? No.” Julien shifted a bit on the hardwood floor and his cheeks tingled again. Even just having Eli this close was beginning to help warm him. “Why on earth would that bother me?”
Eli shrugged as best he could while lying curled on his side. “Doesn’t really work with the fantasy, does it?”
“The fantasy?” Julien repeated while his brain unhelpfully ran a reel of its own favorite examples with Eli newly cast as the lead.
“You know, man masters the monster of Maudit Falls.”
That cut any arousal off at the knees. “Look,” Julien blurted. “I wish you’d stop talking about it like that. I don’t know what I said to make you think I feel anything but thrilled out of my mind to have gotten to share those nights with you. If I was jumpy or behaving weirdly at all it was because I didn’t expect you to come on to me. Not seriously.”
Eli made a rude sound. “I’ve heard the uncommonly sexy man is surprised people want to have sex with him parable before and it tugs the heartstrings harder when not coming from someone who’s already made a fortune off of looking like a walking, talking wet dream.”
“As much as I appreciate the most backhanded compliment of my life, that’s not what I meant,” Julien said tightly. He was feeling positively toasty now. “When you’ve been married practically all your life, people make assumptions. And when men do flirt with me, it’s always as a joke or just so that they can tell their friends they made some has-been squirm. The truth is I haven’t really been with a ton of people. Or much of a, you know, variety. In the gender department...” He sort of faded out at the end realizing he’d said far too much. Maybe he could pass out now and claim blood loss after all.
A small frown line had appeared at the top of Eli’s nose. “Please don’t be attempting to tell me you’re straight as the third plot twist of the evening. Because I may have to opt for the gun, after all.”
“No! God, no, of course not. I know I’m bi or—or something like that. And I don’t want it to sound like I’m all hung up on a gender binary or anything either, but I’m...well, limited. In, ah, the practical experience of some things.”
Eli’s eyebrows rose so high up his forehead, Julien half wondered if he was becoming a wolf again. “You’re trying to tell me you were nervous not because I’m a supposedly mythical creature who may or may not possess key information about your brother’s death, but because I have a dick.”
“When you put it like that it sounds silly,” Julien muttered. “It’s not even about dicks. Not really. I just don’t like doing things badly, and this last year I haven’t been good at anything at all.” He bit his lip. “Usually when I’m not a hundred percent sure of something I avoid it. I’m afraid you’ve met me at a somewhat unusual time in my life.”
“Now, that is surprising,” Eli said with a small wry huff, and despite everything Julien laughed helplessly back.
“The truth is I like you. More than I thought I could during—” He flapped his hand as if he could encompass all of grief with one gesture: Rocky, the unwanted withering of his career, the rapid collapse of two marriages, the failing health of parents whose aging had sped up after the loss of their child, the realization that he himself was suddenly closer to the end of his life than the beginning, the feeling that perhaps he might die while still figuring out how he wanted to live. “Oh, you know, the usual. It’s true I was nervous. But not because you turn into a werewolf or even because I thought you were some ex–cult member with a criminal past. I just...didn’t want to disappoint you.” Julien tried to smile, but it came out more like a wince. “We both know how well that worked out.”
Eli was quiet for a long time, expression unreadable. Then, “Stop saying werewolves. It’s positively archaic. Just wolves.”
Julien blinked at him, surprised. “O-okay.”
“And I don’t turn into anything. Sometimes I’m a wolf in skin. Sometimes I’m a wolf in fur.”
“In skin. In fur.” Julien committed it to memory.
Eli’s gaze darted all over his face, studying him, then he slowly bent his knees so that they just brushed the tops of Julien’s thighs. “You didn’t disappoint me. I enjoyed myself. Very much.”
Julien’s breath hitched. “I’m glad.”
Impulsively he placed his hand on the floor in the scant five inches between them, and only a breath away from Eli’s—an offer and nothing else. There was an endless-seeming pause. Then Eli’s fingers slid forward, the tips hesitantly resting on Julien’s pinkie. His face sharpened to that same intense expression from before and this time Julien had a much better idea as to what it meant.
“You still want me,” Eli murmured with no inflection. A simple observation. It’s cold. We could die tonight. You still want me. But the way he looked up at Julien from under his lashes felt like a question, so Julien answered him anyway.
“Yeah. Of course I do.” Carefully, he rotated his hand until the pads of Eli’s fingers brushed the center of his palm. “Do...do you?”
“I want...” Eli bit his lip and shook his head. He pressed his fingers down until Julien felt the bite of nails, no, claws, along his lifeline. He held very still and a fraction of a second before it broke the skin Eli stopped. “I want to feel different than this.”
Hurt? Afraid? Defenseless? Julien wasn’t sure he knew how to ask that. Wasn’t sure he could hear the answer over the blood rushing through his head.
“How long does this ceasefire of ours last?” His voice was too rough, too intimate for the delicate truce between them.
“Long enough,” Eli said, capturing Julien’s hand in his and tugging him close enough to meet his lips in the middle.
It was different from before. More honest, for one thing. Their first kiss has been buoyant with possibility, newness and the sentimental illusion that maybe this could be something worth building on.
Now they were two people who had no chance of a future or even a later today. They both simply needed a bit of warmth, comfort, and some release from the endless darkness. There was honesty in that, too. Not everything had to be about hope and love and trust to be worth doing. Sometimes it was just the desire to not feel so terribly alone. That was what last kisses were made of. Which didn’t mean Julien was going to savor it any less.
When Eli fell backward, Julien followed him over. Rolling until he was between Eli’s spread legs and pressing him into the floor. He felt a matching hardness against his own. “Is this okay?”
Eli growled, found Julien’s tongue again and sucked on it lightly.
“Fucking hell,” Julien groaned, pulling back. “Wait, wait, wait. Same as last time? Pinch me if you don’t like something?”
Eli sat up just enough to put his mouth by Julien’s ear. “I could quite literally throw you through the window with one hand.”
Julien felt another powerful bolt of that same...something from before. “Yes, but I’d rather you pinched me,” he murmured back, brushing his lips against Eli’s, and then pushed him back down flat on his back, hands on his shoulders.
