Chapter 4

FOUR

F elix pushed Zed off him, which he wouldn't have been able to do if Zed hadn't been ready to go. Zed had always been bigger than him. Broader across the shoulders, taller. Just… more. Felix felt the loss immediately, as if he'd stepped out into a vacuum. Beneath his stupid fancy shirt and pants, his skin itched and tingled. His cock ached. He was so hard. Zed was too, and the memory of their erections bumping together made him want to moan.

Felix rolled off the wide duct and stood. He couldn't catch his breath. He couldn't think. But Zed's words rolled around and around in his head. Like the stars overhead, they wheeled when they should be fixed points. Not your only .

It was stupid to feel the way he did. Zed was right here . They'd kissed. They could do more. But Zed didn't want him in the same way.

"Flick?" Zed formed a bulky shadow next to him.

Felix could smell his skin, his sweat. Taste him on his lips and tongue. "This isn't what I want," he said, cringing at the lie. He craved Zed with obsessive need.

Dipping his chin, Zed gave a short nod and it seemed that would be that. Tension continued to snap between them, but Felix knew if he moved forward, by even a step, the presence of Zed would capture him and he'd never pull free.

And Zed didn't want that.

"This is Marnie's fault," Felix muttered, pulling out his wallet.

Pacing toward the door, he tried pinging Marnie and got no answer. He couldn't say he was surprised. But when he got to the door, he almost laughed. No padlock, but as the door opened outward, there was no handle on this side, and no panel. Nothing for him to hack, nothing for him to bash into submission. Nothing but him and Zed and the stars.

God, he hated feeling trapped like this.

Raising a fist, Felix pounded on the smooth metal. "Marnie? I know you're there. Open the fucking door." He tucked his wallet back into his pocket and attacked the door with two hands. "Marnie! This isn't going to work. You're just pissing me off."

A warm hand closed around his shoulder. Felix shrugged it off. Zed grabbed him again and Felix turned toward him, right fist cocked and ready.

Zed ducked sideways. "Jesus."

"Just keep your hands off me."

Straightening, Zed held up both hands as he took a step back. "Talk to me. Tell me what's going on. 'Cause one minute you're grinding against me, the next you're taking a swing at me."

"I told you I didn't want it. Can't we leave it at that?"

"No. Because you're lying to me. Since when did you start lying to me, man?"

Chest tightening, Felix looked up at the stars and wished he could just launch himself into the sky. Take off, disappear, or maybe cease to exist. He didn't hear Zed step forward, but he felt him, and took a step back.

"Flick, please. Let's not end things like this. You're my best friend. Always."

Felix met Zed's questioning gaze. "What if I want to be more? Always."

Zed shook his head. "Why would you want that? You've got your whole life ahead of you. Training, and then you're going to travel the galaxy. With your skills, you'll see the whole fleet. I can't be the one to hold you back."

"You've never held me back. It's because of you I've got this far. And I don't know if I can…" Felix swallowed. "You're going to have Emma and Marnie and Ryan are going to Mil-Int together and I'm going to be alone. By myself." He took another step back. "I told Marnie this was a bad idea. You didn't need to know any of this."

"I already knew most of it."

Felix shook his head. "You don't know all of it."

"Then tell me."

He didn't want to, but what did it matter? There would be no perfect time for his confession, and they were out of time to fix what he'd probably just broken. So why not throw the words out there? Maybe then Zed would feel it. Maybe he'd hurt. Or, just maybe, he'd pick them up and… carry them. Hold the words close until they could see each other again.

Drawing on every mote of courage in his lean frame, Felix squared his shoulders and looked Zed square in the eye. "I love you."

Zed almost, almost replied with a casual "I love you, too," because he did. He didn't know exactly when he'd started loving Flick—sometime shortly after they'd met, probably—and he knew it wasn't quite like what he felt for his two older brothers. But one look in Flick's eyes told Zed that he was dead serious about this love thing. This wasn't some declaration of brotherly fealty, but the real deal, the heart fully invested, the can't-breathe-without-you sort of love.

And he was telling Zed this now ?

"Why the fuck didn't you tell me sooner?" Zed turned and kicked at nothing, needing to take out his frustration. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw Flick deflate, as though Zed's words had punctured something important. "Goddamn it, we talk about everything."

"Not that," Flick said, his voice small.

Zed blew out a breath, then agreed, "No, not that." But they should have. He speared his fingers through his coiffed hair, which had already mostly been wrecked by the dancing, and tugged. It was a Flick gesture, one he'd picked up years ago. He tilted his head to look up at the stars, winking through the atmosphere as if they knew the answer to this problem but weren't going to tell anyone.

Flick loved him. Like that.

Fuck.

"I love you too, you know?" Zed sighed. "But I don't know if… if it's the same as what you feel. I mean, I feel better when you're with me. I love spending time with you and sharing jokes and stories, watching a holo, whatever. But I just figured out that maybe guys turn me on just as much as girls." And that was a revelation he would need to examine in way more detail, but not now. "So I don't know. If we had more time…"

A soft, sad chuckle left Flick's lips. "Yeah, if we had more time."

Zed closed the distance between the two of them and carefully reached out to rest his hands on Flick's shoulders, prepared to field another punch. The fight seemed to have abandoned his friend, though, leaving him smaller than moments ago.

"What I meant before?" he said softly. "I don't want you to not live your life because you're waiting for something that might not happen. Okay? We're probably not going to be able to do more than exchange the occasional jazer?—"

"That would be enough!"

Zed rubbed Flick's shoulders. "No, it wouldn't. And I know you, Felix Ingesson. You'd use those messages as an excuse to cordon yourself off and not even consider the possibilities around you."

"But—"

Whatever Flick was about to say was cut off by an explosion overhead. Zed whipped around to watch brightly colored sparkles cascade through the night sky, falling to earth like a hundred tiny meteorites. Crackles chased another boom, then another, and a holo played across the darkness.

"Congratulations to the Shepard Academy Class of 2256," Zed read, his voice quiet. He looked back at Flick, taking in the sight of his best friend's features illuminated by red, then blue, then green, then red again.

Beautiful .

A sudden urge to trace the lines of Flick's face with his fingertips threatened to overwhelm him, but Zed tamped it down. Why had he never really noticed how strong Flick's face was before? In the years since they'd met, Flick had filled out—age and good food conspiring to strip the slim boyishness from his features. He'd never be the sort of guy that you'd expect to find on the front lines—not like Zed, who was built like a truck and only seemed to get wider with every passing year—but that was okay. Flick was a fix-it guy, someone who dwelled behind the scenes. His delicate fingers were magic.

"C'mon. Sit with me." Zed pulled at one of Flick's shoulders, then released his grip. "We don't have to talk anymore, if you don't want to." Truthfully, it didn't matter if they spent the rest of the night in silence. Zed just wanted to be here, with Flick, whatever the night brought, because damned if he knew when they'd have a chance to do this again. If they ever did. "Might as well enjoy the show, right?"

Flick glanced at the sealed door, then nodded, his body language transmitting his reluctance with every movement. Zed held back a sigh. Maybe he should just kiss Flick again—stir the flames of horniness so high they forgot everything else. It was tempting, so bloody tempting, but Flick had made it pretty clear he wanted everything or nothing at all.

Zed wished he could give him everything. If they only had more time…

He sat heavily on the duct and leaned back on his hands to watch the lightshow overhead. Flick settled beside him, close enough that Zed could just barely feel the heat radiating from him, but not touching.

"Pretty," Flick said after a few more booms.

Zed nodded as the names of the graduates began streaming by. His was third, after Neal Aarons and Kiro Amago. He didn't say anything as the names progressed through the alphabet, but when Flick's appeared, he bumped his friend's shoulder. Just a reminder that he was there, they'd made it and whatever came next, they'd be all right.

God, he hoped they would be.