Do or Die Reluctant Heroes

Even crappy pizza tasted great, if you were hungry enough. Or if you hadn’t eaten any pizza in nearly a year.

Ian knew this to be a fact.

The human brain was a funny thing, and it distorted and warped perceptions all the time. He knew that, too.

And yet he couldn’t shake the sense that, with Phoebe, he’d just had the absolute best sex of his entire life, despite the fact that from beginning to end the time span spent actually engaging in the act was embarrassingly short.

Although it was possible that the foreplay had started back when she’d found him in Henrietta’s. And wouldn’t that be hard to replicate in the future? An attack by a team of professional thugs, a car chase, the heightened sense of danger that came from running a con against a dangerous mark …? If Ian ever wanted to make love to her again—and he already knew that he did—a candlelight dinner might not be enough.

Because she’d liked it. Playing the game.

And despite her mistakes—for which he could take part of the blame for his failure to communicate—Phoebe had been breathtakingly great at it. Including this last bit, where she’d completely rocked his world.

She was still breathless and clinging to him and looking up at him with those bottomless-pit eyes. He waited, giving her plenty of eye contact, but she didn’t say a word, so he finally pulled out and away from her softness and heat. He’d been half-expecting a lecture on the proper use of condoms—immediate withdrawal was mandatory, don’t let that thing leak, et cetera. But she stayed uncharacteristically quiet even as he sat on the edge of the bed and cleaned himself up—she’d conveniently brought a stack of tissues into the room with her.

As if she’d somehow known.

No, she couldn’t have known. Her surprise had been genuine.

Shit. He himself hadn’t known. He’d come into the room to apologize for his outburst and try to explain that he’d wanted to send her away because his worry for her safety was taking up too much space in his head. He’d have tactfully left out the part where another huge amount of his mental real estate was being used by his near-constant desire to do what they’d just done.

And yeah. Part of him must’ve known. He hadn’t snagged that condom from the Dutchman’s guest bathroom in case of an emergency need to make balloon animals.

Phoebe finally spoke. “When do you expect Francine to get back with Berto?”

Ian turned to see that she’d pulled the covers up to her chin, which was a crying shame.

“I don’t know,” he said as he put his trash into a white container with sides reminiscent of a flower’s petals. “Soon. She’ll text when they’re on their way.”

“And you’re sure he’s not dangerous?”

“Oh, Berto’s dangerous.” Ian found his phone in the pocket of his jeans as he pulled them back on. There was nothing from Francie yet. “I just don’t think he’s dangerous to us.”

“Even though his father wants to kill your brother and what, send Sheldon to conversion therapy?”

“Probably, yeah. Or worse. But Berto’s different from his father. That whole like father, like son myth is the biggest crock of bullshit.” He heard his voice getting louder and he laughed at himself as he sat down again on the end of the bed. “Sorry. Apparently that’s still a hot button issue for me—being myself the progeny of a miscreant scumbag.”

“Although it really must help with the ongoing development of the bad-guy myth,” she pointed out.

He looked over at her, intentionally choosing to misunderstand. “For Berto? I’m sure it does.”

“And for you,” she said, but he spoke over her and pretended not to hear. No way were they going there.

“I’ve been hearing stories about Berto for years,” Ian told her. “What he did. Who he was, and who he became. How he changed—this sudden Jekyll-and-Hyde type transformation, like he finally showed his true shit-ugly colors. Like he’d been hiding himself from Francine and Shelly, the whole time they were kids—and I just don’t buy it. Francie’s condemnation of him was the harshest, and again, I think she got it at least partly wrong. Just to be clear, I don’t blame her at all for thinking what she thinks—feeling what she feels. What that douchebag did to her was awful. Unforgivable, even. But I think he was just a stupid kid who f*cked up—in a very huge way that he couldn’t take back. Some mistakes can’t be fixed.”

Phoebe sat up at that, but kept the covers still demurely tucked beneath her arms as she found her glasses and put them on. Her hair had mostly come loose from its ponytail, and she let the rest of it down so that it tumbled around her shoulders.

As Ian looked at her, he felt something in his chest slip and shift. The pressure came with a blood-tingling rush of triumph and satisfaction, pride and a deeply burning sense of possessiveness. His inner caveman warrior had been awakened and wanted to rush around the room, peeing into the corners, marking it—and her—as his own, while shouting Mine! and randomly smashing things for emphasis.

But he knew that what he was feeling was the equivalent of emotional and hormonal indigestion. He hadn’t done this in a long time. And he particularly hadn’t done it with a woman he liked as much as this one. In fact, he’d never had sex with anyone that he genuinely liked as much as he liked Phoebe.

And God damn, but he wanted to crawl back into that bed with her and dive down beneath the covers and—

“Are you allowed to tell me?” she asked him as if she were repeating herself. “What exactly Berto did?”

Ian cleared his throat. “Yeah,” he said. “Sorry. I was just, um, making a mental to-do list.” He cleared his throat again. “Talking about Berto should probably be on there, too, but … If we’re going to do this thing right, you really need to know everything that I know about the Dutchman and … That’s gonna suck. I’ve gotta share that story with the rest of the team, too, so I want to tell it only once, if that’s okay.”

“Of course,” she murmured.

“Meanwhile, part of my brain is still trying to figure how to do this job without you. And if I can’t do that, how do I keep you safe? Or turn you into a field operative with a Navy SEAL skill level, with only twelve hours of training?”


She smiled. “I think you can stop expending any mental energy on that one.”

“Yeah, I know.” He ran his hands through his hair. “I gotta go talk to Aaron, too. He’s a freaking mess. I need to apologize, try to fix things.”

“Maybe you should close your eyes for a little while,” Phoebe said. “But maybe not here—not that I don’t want you to stay. I do. But … I’m afraid I’ll distract you.”

Jesus. Please stop being perfect.

“When we’re with the Dutchman,” Ian told her, “when we’re running the con, you are so f*cking in love with me that you don’t leave my side. Do you understand?”

Phoebe nodded, her face solemn, her eyes serious. “I can play it that way.”

“He’s gonna want you,” Ian told her. “Because he thinks you’re mine, and he’s a twisted son of a bitch. So he’s gonna try to get you alone. That is not gonna happen.”

She nodded again. “So I was right. About the whole con-artist thing.” At his blank look, she added, “You just said when we’re running the con.”

Ah. “Yeah, well, you’re not entirely right,” Ian said as he found his shirt and yanked it over his head. “My team and I can get past nearly any security system if we need to. Or at least we could a year ago, when we were up and running. But why go to the trouble, if I can talk my way inside?”

“Still,” she said.

Ian gave it to her. “Yes. You were right.”

She didn’t whoop, hands above her head as she ran a victory lap around the room. She didn’t say, I knew it!, or even so much as smile.

She simply sat there as she nodded again, graciously accepting her win like a mature adult. “Go talk to your brother,” she said. “And then try to get some sleep.”

Ian kissed her—how could he not?

He must’ve been looking at her oddly then, because she laughed a little and asked him, “What?”

So he told her. “I wouldn’t’ve been able to not gloat.”

“I bet you’d refrain if you knew I was facing an ass-kicking from my brother. If I had one. Go,” Phoebe said. “Just do it. Get it over with.”

So Ian grabbed his socks and boots and went, looking back at her one last time before quietly closing the door behind him.

It was only then, when he was out in the hall, that he heard her say, “Yes! I knew I was right.”

And Ian had to smile, because he knew that she’d said it for him to overhear.

* * *

Berto was in the Pelican Deck, sitting at the same table, drinking what looked like the same brand of beer, and quite possibly wearing the same clothes he’d had on last time Martell had been in here.

Francine hesitated when she spotted him, and Martell briefly touched her on the arm. “If you want to wait in the car, I can make first contact,” he murmured, but she shook her head and kept going.

Possibly because Berto had already turned to see her coming.

Martell was the only one in the bar who seemed to notice their time-slipping, thunderclap-worthy first moment of eye contact after a decade of separation. For a moment, as Berto gazed at Francine, he lost his dead-eye look. He actually lifted his heavy lids and tightened the slack and underused muscles in his usually expressionless face.

The man still loved her—of that Martell had absolutely no doubt.

But oh, the humanity vanished as Berto’s eyes flickered in recognition as he looked from Francine to Martell and back.

“Silly me. I should’ve known your boy here was a member of Team Dunn,” he said, and then he started to sing that old Sesame Street song. “One of these things is not like the others …”

Martell glanced at Francine. “Wow, you were right about that whole racist dickhead thing. So much for my hopes and dreams of being besties with your ex.”

“He’s not Team Dunn,” she told Berto flatly. “He’s Team Francine.”

As Berto glanced at him again, Martell presented him with his best Mona Lisa smile—assuming Mona Lisa’s knowing expression was the result of happy memories of being hoovered by a beautiful hot blonde.

“Don’t call him boy again,” Francie added.

“Lotta don’ts,” Berto said. “Don’t come carrying, don’t bring ID. Especially considering Dunn’s the one wants my help.”

“Let’s cut the bullshit,” Martell said. “We all know you’re the one who’s been reaching out to Francine, trying to earn, what? Redemption? You want this more than we do—that’s a fact. So let’s take a walk out into the back parking lot, where we’ll make sure you followed all those don’ts. ’Kay?”

Berto picked up his glass of beer. Finished it. Set it back down. Climbed down off of his stool. “Lead on.”

“No fast moves,” Francine warned. “Hands where I can see them at all times.” She nodded at Martell who led the way to the back door.

He held it open for Berto and then Francine. It was dark out there, but he could see the white van, with Yashi and Deb inside, parked out on the street. They’d surveilled this place thoroughly upon arrival—taking nearly two hours to conclude that Berto had, indeed, come here alone.

Francine had left his car at the shadowy edge of the half-filled parking lot, and Martell now led the way there as she drew her weapon, keeping it trained on Berto. She kept the handgun in close to her body, though, so that it wouldn’t catch the light or otherwise draw attention.

She’d already given Martell back his keys after making sure that his trunk was completely clear. He unlocked and opened it now as Berto sighed heavily.

“Are you f*cking kidding me?” he asked.

“Nope.” Francine smiled tightly at him. “It was either this or bag over the head, and darn it, I couldn’t find any bags.”

Another big sigh. “Great.” He turned to climb in, but she stopped him.

“Yeah, not so fast,” she said. “Take your clothes off, first.”

The heavy eyelids did their vanishing thing again, and Berto glanced very briefly at Martell before he refocused on Francine.

“Yeah, that’s not what this is about,” Martell interjected. “This is neither one of us wanting to get close enough to do a pat-down. So strip it to your briefs, Holmes, and if you’re not wearing briefs, sorry, the boxers gotta go, too.”

“Jesus effin’ Christ.” Berto shrugged out of his jacket and held it out as if he were the lord of Downton Abbey and Martell were his valet. Martell took it—and dropped it on the driveway. Berto was not happy. “Hey. That’s an expensive sports coat.”

“And I’m sure some grateful, homeless drunk will enjoy it very much before he pukes down the front of it,” Martell told him.

Shaking his head, Berto didn’t bother trying to hand him his shirt. He dropped it onto his jacket with a dark look in Martell’s direction. His shoes followed, along with his socks.

The man could’ve stood to say no five or six dozen of the times in the recent past that he’d been asked if he wanted to super-size his fries. He had maybe thirty extra pounds on him and was understandably self-conscious about it. He was not at all happy about having to take off his T-shirt or his pants. His pants went first—he was wearing silk boxers—and like a lot of too-heavy men, he had strong, muscular legs. No shame there.


“Look, you can see I’m not carrying or concealing anything,” Berto said, running his hands across his chest and then down the front of his shorts.

“Sorry, bro,” Martell said, “but the mere fact that you want to keep it on means you gotta take it off.”

“No, it’s okay,” Francine suddenly said, handing her weapon over to Martell. “I’ll … just … Turn around. Assume the position.”

Berto turned and gave her the classic perp stance, bracing his hands against the side of the car as he spread his legs.

Watching Francine pat him down was a little weird. But Martell held that weapon at ready as she ran her hands across the man’s chest, under his man-boobs and his arms, and then down and around the elastic waistband of his shorts, and … ooohkay. She gave him a swift but thorough package and butt-crack check—all the while gritting her teeth so hard that Martell could almost hear them breaking.

“Hands behind your back,” she ordered Berto, who glanced back at her as he complied.

She had a pair of handcuffs that she pulled out of her jeans pocket, and she clipped them around his wrists in a way that was pure Top Cops. Or maybe Aardvark the Bounty Hunter or whatever mammal was currently bounty hunting on reality TV. She’d clearly done it before.

“Get in,” she said, and Berto rolled himself into the trunk with one last baleful glance at Martell.

Francine didn’t check to make sure all of his fingers and toes were accounted for. She just slammed the trunk closed and took back her handgun from Martell, stashing it wherever she usually kept it. “I still want to sweep him, but I’m pretty sure he’s clear,” she said briskly as Martell gathered up the man’s clothes. Despite what he’d said about the homeless man, that jacket was nice and those Italian leather shoes were expensive. And from what little he knew of Ian Dunn’s plan, Berto was going to have to look like Berto. Provided the clothes weren’t bugged, they would give it all back. “We can do it on the road. Let’s go.”

She climbed into the car, but she got into the passenger seat, which was weird, but okay. He’d drive. Maybe like Deb, she was tired. That entire encounter couldn’t’ve been easy.

As Martell slid behind the wheel, she said, still in that clear, crisp voice: “Unless you want to f*ck me first, here in the parking lot.”

Martell glanced over his shoulder, into the back, where the seat cushions were the only thing separating them from the trunk. No doubt old Berto could hear every word they spoke. Particularly when she enunciated that clearly.

“As tempting as that sounds,” he said. “Dunn’s waiting on us.”

But when Martell looked back at Francie, he saw that she’d covered her face with hands that were shaking.

Crap. “But if you insist,” he said. He started the car with a roar and kept his foot slightly on the gas so that his POS was even noisier than normal. Just to be safe, he turned on the radio, too. It was set to a local AM station, and happy, joyful salsa music pounded out of the ancient speakers.

But that was good. It was probably deafening in the back. And those lyrics sung in Spanish would be perceived as an extra f*ck you to old Berto. That felt pretty right, too.

“I’m sorry,” Francie whispered as her eyes brimmed with tears.

“For what? Being human? It happens to the best of us,” Martell whispered back as he put his arms around her, held her close, and just let her cry.

* * *

Aaron didn’t want to talk to anyone.

But when Ian found him, sitting in the living room with the lights off, headphones on, he sat down, too.

So Aaron embraced the military acronym KISS—keep it simple, stupid—and used language that he knew his brother would understand: “Leave me the f*ck alone.”

There had been times, in the past, when Aaron had said that without meaning it, but this was not one of them.

Ian, being Ian, pushed. “I know you’re mad at me, but I’m not sorry for doing everything in my power to make sure that you, and Shel, and Rory are safe.”

Aaron took off his headphones then and looked at him. “You don’t give a damn about Shel and Rory. You do whatever the f*ck you think you need to do to take care of me. Shel and Rory are just appendages that you now have to deal with. Attachments that I drag around—that’s how you think of them, that’s how you treat them. You have no idea what it means to be in a relationship, to be part of a real family—so you have no idea of what’s best for me. In fact, you still think of me as your appendage—a responsibility you’re forced to drag around.”

“That’s not true—” Ian started.

“The f*ck it is,” Aaron shot back at him. “Look at you, sitting there. What, you came to talk to me, to counsel me, impart your wisdom—to tell me that life’s too short not to accept Shel’s apology? What the f*ck do you know about the kind of relationship I have with my husband? It’s a partnership, douchebag—and you’ve never, not once in your life, had that. It’s not king and subject, or father-figure and child, or owner and encumbrance, or however you think of it. It’s fifty-fifty—no, it’s a-hundred-a-hundred, because you give everything, and you get everything in return. And you don’t keep the kind of secrets that you made Sheldon keep from me. You f*cking don’t.”

“I’m sorry,” Ian whispered. “The choices that I had—”

“The choices you had,” Aaron cut him off. “Listen to you. I not we. We had choices, Eee, last year, when Francine found her sister. We made the choice to put Pauline into a hospital, even though we knew that her medical records would lead Davio back to me. We chose to try to save her life—to save Rory’s life, even though we knew that Davio was going to come after me again. Me. I’m the one he wants to end. But you shut me out. You took control. You decided that you knew best, so you made the rest of the choices all by yourself, because you knew damn well that I wouldn’t have let you go to f*cking prison—”

“There was no time—”

“Is that what you tell yourself? You know what I think?” Aaron told his brother. “I think you liked being there, in prison—running that kind of a long con. And I gotta assume that’s what you were doing there, that you weren’t really only working for Manny—that your plan was to bring the Dellarosas down from the inside out, because you’re Ian f*cking Dunn, and that’s what you do.”

Ian didn’t say anything, which was the closest Aaron was going to get to an affirmative.

“And I think that you think being in prison is also a fitting punishment for all of your various sins,” Aaron continued. “It’s a grand, beautiful, selfless sacrifice, so win/win, right? Plus, you’re safe when you’re in there—same way you’re safe when you’re on a mission—because you’re not yourself. It’s not real, even if you let people get close. Kinda like what you’re doing right now with Phoebe.”

Ian looked up at that, and Aaron laughed.

“Yeah, you really think I didn’t know?” Aaron asked. “And the stupid thing is that you have no clue, no idea just how much you honestly care about this woman. Or maybe you do, and that terrifies you. So you’re just going to run your same old pattern with her. Use her, then push her away. You f*cking coward.”


Ian finally spoke. “You done?”

“Yeah, I’m done,” Aaron said, putting his headphones back on as he got up and walked out of the room. “Now leave me the f*ck alone.”

* * *

After the scathing dressing-down from Aaron, Ian went back into the kitchen. Or at least that’s where he’d intended to go. Grab some quick protein from the cold cut drawer to keep his stomach from rumbling as he closed his eyes and shut down his brain for a few minutes, because Jesus, after that verbal battering, he needed it.

Instead he blinked and found himself upstairs, standing outside of Phoebe’s bedroom door. Knocking. Softly. In case she was asleep.

“It’s unlocked,” he heard her say, so he opened it. Peered in.

She’d sat up and was peering back at him.

“Everything okay?” she asked, her voice rich and warm with her concern. He had a flash of a very vivid, very recent memory, of kissing her as she wrapped herself around him, her body soft and warm and welcoming.

No, it’s not okay, actually, because my brother just ground my face in a truth that I’ve known for years—that I’m irreparably broken. Everything I do, I do for him, in part because I feel as if I let him down—badly—back when he was a kid, and in part because, with his love for Shel and Rory, he has something beautiful and precious that I know I’ll never be able to have—because I’m irreparably broken.

“Yeah,” Ian said. “Still no word from Francie. Shel’s gone to bed, and Aaron’s still really angry and upset … and I’m …”

A f*cking coward.

“Come in,” she said.

So he did, leaning against the door to close it behind him.

“This isn’t a booty call,” he told her, and as soon as the words left his lips, he realized how stupid he sounded.

Phoebe laughed. “I’d be impressed if it was. You haven’t been gone all that long.”

He moved closer, needing contact. “Do you mind if I …?”

She answered by shifting over and flipping back the edge of the covers.

He’d carried his socks and boots with him when he’d gone looking for Aaron, but he hadn’t put them on—which made taking off his jeans that much easier. He now shucked off his T-shirt, too and slid back under the covers.

And there Phoebe was—warm and smooth and soft—exactly what he wanted and needed. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her against him so that they were spooning, their legs entwined. He had one hand against the fullness of her stomach, the other filled with as much as he could hold of her generous breasts. Her ass was tight against him, and she glanced over her shoulder and up into his face, her eyes filled with amusement.

“How youthful of you,” she said.

“It’s part of that whole crazy thing,” he admitted. “I’ve had a major hard-on for you since, well, you want me to be honest?”

That got the rise out of her that he expected. “No, because women love it when men lie.”

Ian kissed her neck, not only because he wanted to, but because it was the next step in this dance they were engaged in—a dance that, according to his brother, was going to end with him pushing her away. But, God, right now he wanted her closer—as close as humanly possible. She was a perfect mix of solid and soft, and she smelled unbelievably good. “Since I walked into the prison interview room and caught you checking me out. That was pretty hot, you know.”

“But then you got to know me and grew to want me for my brilliant mind and snappy sense of humor,” she said. “Which was even hotter.”

She was smiling, and Ian knew that she was expecting a light-hearted, flirty response—for him to say, Oh, much, much hotter, and then kiss her as he ran his hands across the silk of her skin.

It was what he should’ve done, but Aaron’s words were still bouncing around in his head, so he went with the truth instead. “I could’ve resisted you, if you were just a beautiful woman with, you know, a killer body. Not that I don’t appreciate it, but I’ve always been able to walk away from that. Apparently, though, I have no defenses against the way you make me feel.”

Phoebe didn’t seem to know what to do with his honesty. She was disarmed to the point of silence, which was good because he’d freaked himself out with that one, too. Feel? Feel? What the f*ck? And really, what was the point? Aaron was right. Ian knew exactly how this was going to end.

But Phoebe turned toward him and kissed him, thoroughly, and as Ian kissed her back, he tried to drown out his brother’s accusations. He thought about Berto. About Francine, who was talking to Berto probably right now. About Phoebe having both saved his life and f*cked up his plan by telling the Dutchman that they were married. Married, Jesus. You f*cking coward. About where to charter a luxury speedboat—a big one, with room for cargo—for the least amount of cash. About whether the Dutchman would take the bait and call him in the morning. About the best way for Ian to guarantee Phoebe’s safety when he did—

Phoebe stopped kissing him. “I can hear you thinking.”

Ian sighed and forced a smile. “Yeah. Sorry.”

Phoebe shifted over, further onto her side so that she could see him better. “You want to talk?”

Ian laughed.

She laughed, too, before she kissed him again, but sadly, then, she stopped kissing him.

“Okay,” she said. “I get that you have way too much testosterone to want to talk, but we could either both lie here, awake, or …” She pushed his hair back from his face, running her fingers through it. “Tell me about Berto. And Francine? What happened between them? I mean, don’t feel you have to share anything with me that isn’t important, but …”

“No,” Ian said again. “You should know. You’re involved with this mission now, like it or not, and he’s going to be a part of it—so the whole messed-up dynamic’s going to be in your face for the duration.” He took a deep breath. “Let’s see if I can’t explain this in as few words as possible. Ready?”

“I am,” she said, now playing with the hair on his chest, which felt unbelievably good.

He gave her what he thought of as the Dragnet version. Just the facts, ma’am.

Aaron and Shel’s secret relationship, started in high school.

The sex tape that threatened to out them both.

Francine’s sacrifice.

Berto’s rage and jealousy as he accepted, without question, her obvious lie—that she was the one in that tape, having sex with Aaron.

“Berto took a loaded weapon with him,” Ian told Phoebe, “when he went to confront Aaron—who ended up locked in the trunk of Berto’s car, outside of one of the Dellarosa family warehouses. He’s not really sure what happened. He was pretty certain that Berto brought him there to kill him, but before he escaped from the trunk, he heard shouting and gunshots. We still don’t know what happened, whether it was an accident or intentional or what, but it was Berto’s gun that was fired. When Shel and Francine showed up—they were searching for Berto so they could tell him the truth before he did something stupid; too late—they found him trying to keep a homeless man from bleeding out.”

“Oh my God,” Phoebe murmured.

“The man died from his bullet wounds,” Ian told her. “It was then that Berto even more fully embraced the dark side. He called his father instead of the police. And Davio came and got rid of the body—covered the whole thing up. In return, Berto went to work for his family.”


They were both silent then.

And Ian could have let it go at that—he’d told her what Berto had done, and how, try as he might, the man couldn’t take any of it back. He couldn’t fix the mess he’d made.

But Ian found himself opening his mouth and saying, “The bitch of it is, that what Berto did, by not trusting Francine …? I made Aaron do the same thing to Shel.”

Phoebe looked searchingly up at him. “Is this what they’re fighting about?”

“No,” Ian said. “That’s … me continuing to screw things up for them.” Jesus. He rolled onto his back again, so that he wouldn’t have to meet her gaze. “What happened back then was, well, after the sex tape went viral—at least at Brentwood—Aarie got kicked out of the school for sexual misconduct. It wasn’t an issue of gay or straight; the rule was no sex. At all. Turns out his scholarship had a morality clause—which should’ve tipped me off at the start. Aaron didn’t belong there, and I don’t know what I was thinking when I made him accept that scholarship.”

Phoebe propped her head up on her elbow, which put her back into eye contact range. “You were probably thinking, Yay, a scholarship to a good prep school. This was the award that made it possible for you to stay in the Navy, right? After your elderly aunt died? The one that Aaron was living with …?”

That’s right. He’d almost forgotten. Phoebe had read his file. “Susan Bergeron wasn’t related. Not by blood,” Ian said, pulling Phoebe close so that she was nestled in the crook of his arm, her head against his shoulder. He could now see the top of her head, and feel her breasts against his side and chest. God, he didn’t want to stop touching her. Not ever. “She was a friend.” He laughed. “A savior, actually. She let Aaron live with her so I could be a selfish prick and run away and join the Navy.”

For a few years, the arrangement had worked happily. Ian had just gone through BUD/S, the rigorous SEAL training, when he got the call about Susan’s fatal stroke. He took extended leave, both for the funeral and to spend time with Aaron, who’d just lost the closest thing to a mother that either of them had ever known.

“That must’ve been hard, when she died,” Phoebe murmured.

“It was,” Ian said. “Aaron was devastated.”

“I meant, hard for you,” she said, pulling back and pushing herself up so that she could look into his eyes again. “You must’ve been devastated. I mean, to lose someone you thought of as a savior?”

And yes, he had used that word, hadn’t he? “I couldn’t be,” Ian admitted. “Devastated. I had to take care of Aaron.”

“Yeah, but that’s not how it works,” Phoebe told him. “You feel what you feel, whether you want to feel it or not, whether you show it or talk about it or not.”

“Yeah, well, when you don’t show it or talk about it, it’s easier to set aside,” he admitted. “That was a hard year. Maybe the hardest ever.”

“Harder than being in jail?”

Ian laughed. “Oh, yeah. Compared to that, Northport was a cakewalk. This situation was extra bad, because on top of Susan’s dying, which was awful, it also looked like I was going to have to leave the Teams to take care of Aaron,” he told her, then explained, “The SEAL Teams. I’d made it in by then, and it was … an honor that I wanted to keep. It was proof that I was worthy.” Jesus, what was he telling her? He swiftly went on. “Anyway, I was sure I’d have to take at least some kind of temporary leave, but then my CO found this scholarship program. To Brentwood. Aaron said he wanted to go, but I knew he didn’t. It was not the right school for a kid like him.”

“If he hadn’t gone, he wouldn’t have met Sheldon,” Phoebe pointed out.

That was true. But it was long past time to end this conversation.

Except she moved closer, shifting her leg up and across him, all that smooth skin sliding up his thighs and then even higher as she said, “Rewind a sec, back to Berto.” She’d also started tracing the muscles in his chest and abs, and it all felt too freaking great to make her stop. Not yet anyway. “I’m still not sure why he was at fault for believing Francine when she said she’d hooked up with Aaron. I mean, she said it, right? Was he supposed to read her mind and know that she was lying?”

“No,” Ian said. “Yes. Maybe. Okay, I know it sounds crazy, but I’m gonna go with yes. Berto abandoned Francine because he didn’t have faith. She’d told him, repeatedly, that she loved him. Told him and showed him, too. I mean, that’s how it’s supposed to work, right? You let down your guard, you let this one person see you without all the bullshit and the walls and the pretense and …”

He was suddenly hyperaware of the way Phoebe was watching him—the quiet somberness in her eyes, the empathy and understanding on her face. But she didn’t say anything this time—no comments, no questions, no quips. She just watched and waited.

So he kept going, because there was a point here to be made. “Berto knew her. She risked a lot to let him really know her. She’s sweet, she’s funny, she’s smart, and she’s lived most of her life in danger of some kind, so she’s cautious and wary. And it’s insane that she would just suddenly, randomly hook up with some high school kid—some friend of Sheldon’s? Come on. It doesn’t take much imagination to figure that out. But when push came to shove, when it mattered the most, Berto chose to believe this one, single, completely f*cking insane thing.” He searched for the exact words to explain this to her. “Look, I know it seems crazy when you define it as his ability to read her mind, and that’s not what I’m saying. I’m saying that this kid had a ton of data to use when he hit this particular what-the-f*ck scenario. And he chose to accept this one jarringly dissonant statement that Francine told his father, even though it clashed with everything else—everything else—he knew about her.

“He didn’t have faith in her,” he said again. “And because of that he lost it all.”

Phoebe nodded. “I get it,” she said softly. “But I also get that it’s really hard not to be stupid when love’s involved.”

“No kidding.”

They lay there in silence for several long moments.

“So what awful thing did Aaron do to Shel?” Phoebe asked. “You said …?”

“Yeah. Okay. Part two of this amazing f*ckup,” Ian told her on an exhale. “Aaron got expelled while I was prepping to go to Afghanistan with my team, and suddenly I had forty-eight hours to get to Florida, collect him from school, and figure out what the hell I was gonna do with him. Shelly, meanwhile, was dealing with the aftermath of Berto’s meltdown. See, when Berto finally realized that Francie lied to protect her gay brother—when he realized that he’d majorly f*cked things up, his head exploded and he took it out on Shel. So Shel wrote Aarie an email, telling him it was over, breaking things off—in an attempt to keep him safe.”

“Which … you think was somehow, in some way, the equivalent of the lie that Francine told?”

“That email was just as bullshit insane,” Ian told her. “Stay away from me. I wish I’d never met you. It was just as dissonant. So yes. After getting that email, Aaron abandoned Shelly for the exact same reasons that Berto abandoned Francine. Because he didn’t have faith. Well, he did, but I talked him out of it, freaking genius that I am.”


He stopped, suddenly aware that his voice had broken, and that his eyes had filled with tears. You have no idea what it means to be in a relationship, to be part of a real family.… Aaron was right about that. Ian didn’t know—he hadn’t known—and he’d f*cked it up for his little brother, big-time.

Here and now, though, he could feel Phoebe listening. Just waiting for him to explain.

Ian swallowed. Cleared his throat. Kept his eyes closed as he tried to push away all of the bullshit emotion that blurred his vision. “They had this plan for their future. Go north together. To Boston. They’d get an apartment, and Aaron would work while Shel went to school. MIT. Shel got a scholarship.”

“That’s kind of amazing,” Phoebe said softly. “That they recognized how well they fit together, that they wanted forever, starting all the way back when they were teenagers.”

“Yup, it was amazing—until I dropped in and saved the day,” Ian said. “Aaron knew that the breakup email Shel sent him was crap. He wanted to go to Massachusetts and wait for Shel to show and … I stopped him. I made him enlist. I made him accept the lie, to admit defeat. I made him join the Marines—because anything else was f*cking inconvenient. For me.”

“To be fair to you, he was just a kid, and you were responsible for his safety.”

“He was days from turning eighteen,” Ian countered. “Did you know, Shelly loved Aaron so much, he spent four years searching for him? If I hadn’t butted in and convinced Air that having his heart broken was just another normal part of life, Aaron would’ve been waiting and Sheldon would’ve found him, that very first August. But no, I was an impatient douchebag with places to go.”

She laughed. “I’m sorry, but Afghanistan isn’t exactly high on most people’s list of fascinating travel destinations. And I think the phrase you originally used was selfish prick.”

Uh-oh. He had said that, hadn’t he?

“Although, I’m not sure how accurate that is, considering how many years you’d spent raising your brother—back when you were supposed to be a kid yourself.”

Jesus, he didn’t want to talk about this. Ian closed his eyes, and they both lay there for several long moments, just breathing.

Phoebe finally laughed—just a little. It was more of a voiced smile than an actual chuckle. “I can tell from your terrified silence,” she said, “that you’ve started praying to whatever God you believe in that I don’t say something like Wow, Eee, with those feelings of intense responsibility, it’s really not that surprising that you would sacrifice your own life and go to jail as part of some Quixotic quest to protect Aaron and Sheldon.”

Ian didn’t open his eyes, because she was right. He really didn’t want to go there.

“There are some mistakes you can’t fix. I think I’m paraphrasing, but that’s the gist of what you said, isn’t it? About Berto. But it applies to you, too. Right? And since you can’t fix four lost years, you, what? Try, instead, to get redemption some other, only nearly impossible way?” She shifted then, and kissed him. “Don’t panic. I know this thing we’re doing here is temporary, and that your craziness about me is going to pass. Maybe it already has.” She laughed lightly. “I suspect I’m helping it along. But you’re a smart guy with a really big brain, and it seems silly to take me as a temporary girlfriend, and then only use me for sex.”

As Phoebe spoke, her hand—the one she’d been using to trace circles on his chest and stomach—moved lower. She shifted her leg, too, found his semi-erection, and stroked him, her fingers soft and warm.

“It’s nice to have someone to talk to,” she murmured. “Every now and then. You know, you asked me, a couple days ago, about why I carry a gun.”

Ian opened his eyes at that. “You don’t have to—”

“I know,” she interrupted, smiling at him. “But at this point, I’m pretty sure you won’t judge me—certainly not as much as I judge myself. See, I had a roommate in college—a really good friend—Emma. Junior year, she was sexually assaulted. Without going into much detail: it was bad, and it really changed her. She became so fearful—I’m not blaming her, of course, but her fear ruled her. It overwhelmed her. I went with her to all these support groups, hoping she’d find some relief, but …” She shook her head. “Nothing helped. I finally signed us up for a class at a firing range. I thought maybe that would empower her, but it didn’t help, either. She dropped out of the class after the second week. She ended up leaving college—she just went home and hid. I think she’s still hiding. I don’t know—we lost touch.”

“And I would judge you because … you knew when it was time to let her go?” Ian asked.

“Being her friend got really hard,” Phoebe admitted. “And yes, I let her go, but I stayed with the class at the firing range. I was good at it—I’m not a great marksperson, but I’m pretty good, and … I liked it. I took more classes, learned all about gun safety, got licensed.… I did it to help her, but I benefited.”

“That’s not a bad thing,” Ian told her.

“I feel as if I should’ve done more,” she said.

“I know that feeling well,” he said, but of course she already knew that—as perceptive as she was.

“Thank you for letting me talk,” she said with a smile that was pure innocence.

Ian smiled back at her, because they both knew damn well that he would be willing to “talk” to her for hours, provided she kept touching him like that.

“Of course, if you don’t want to have a conversation,” Phoebe added, “you know how to shut me up.”

Ian laughed and shifted slightly in an attempt to see her face. “Tragically, I’m out of condoms,” he said, losing himself a little in her eyes and her touch.

“Do you think Yashi would say anything if we put them on the list? Or would they just appear?”

“I’m betting they’ll just appear,” Ian said.

“Hmm,” she said. “Future tense. I approve that message. Present tense—we’re both extremely creative. Of course, we could always talk more—”

Ian felt her smile as he kissed her and swept his hands down her incredible body. And then, as he waited for Francine to call and Berto to arrive, he did his best to limit Phoebe’s talking to exclamations of the affirmative, and whispers of his name, while he ignored the echo of Aaron’s voice that resounded over and over in his head.

You f*cking coward.

He didn’t have to worry about pushing Phoebe away.

Life was going to do that for him.