Hunter

HUNTER

It took me four days before the research began.

I knew Kai was keeping a close eye on me, but it wasn't like he was hanging over my shoulder. I knew he was waiting to see how I would react to everything that had happened over the weekend. Maybe he was expecting me to have a psychotic episode or a mental breakdown as I realized I had taken a human life with a surprising amount of ease.

Which was weirdly fascinating. On one hand, the idea of killing someone was still abhorrent to me. The lack of remorse for what I'd done went against everything I'd been told about being a normal, good person. The only way to settle my worries had been to look at different people throughout the day. First, I'd tried Arwen and Rich, picturing taking a knife to them or, hell, just pushing them in front of the bus. And then I'd tried it with people I wasn't close to, a random woman on the street, an old man who'd stopped on the sidewalk and almost made me fall.

Admittedly, the last one had been annoying as hell, but…no, the idea of insulting them made me recoil, let alone killing them. Yet the dealer, whose name I didn't know and didn't care to know, had died horribly by my hand, and I wasn't tormented or even slightly angsty over it. Sure, I could try to paint it as doing the world a favor, but after killing someone in a dark alley with their own knife, it was kind of hard to justify lying to myself. I had killed the man not just to save my life but because he was a foul creature who deserved every bit of terror and pain he suffered.

That last part stuck in my head and whirled around, making me think. It was easy to justify what I'd done based on self-defense, and even not going to the cops made sense. Who wanted that kind of trouble over someone who tried to kill me…again.

Yet, the thought of what I'd done didn't make me recoil or shrink back in horror. If anything, it made me think about the rightness of what I'd done. Yet, in the nights that followed, I didn't lose a wink of sleep over it; in fact, I slept better than ever. Yet, I hadn't felt that sense of helplessness like before and was frustrated that I'd tasted some semblance of my former self-assurance but couldn't quite get it all back.

Yet, and yet, and yet…so many thoughts swirled and spun in my mind until they were all I could think of.

Which was where the research came in. The idea of research had come a couple of days after the dealer's death. I also knew I needed to be careful, so I made a few inquiries to discover a decent VPN service to cover my IP, and then, using that, I did some digging on the somewhat infamous and ominously named dark web.

The dark web took me a few days to get the hang of. It didn't navigate like the regular internet and demanded more than point-and-click. However, once that had been done, I began digging where it would go unnoticed. It was a place where the worst, most degenerate people could operate with impunity…but it also allowed me to look up things I didn't want traced back to me, and I could do it in the privacy of my apartment.

"Who's that?"

The sudden presence of someone behind me sent an electric shock through my whole body as I yelped. The laptop dropped from my lap and, thankfully, onto a pillow from the couch that had fallen when Big Melvin had decided to squeeze his chunky butt between me and the arm of the couch. The cats that had congregated scattered as I turned to glare at the man who had ruined my peace and quiet by walking around silently.

"What the hell happened to trying to make more noise when you move around?" I demanded, bothered by the fact that he didn't look the least bit guilty about startling me. Which meant he had intentionally sneaked up on me.

"I'm sure you can imagine I've been a little concerned about my best friend, who had a rough weekend," he said. I watched him pop a Pringle in his mouth and bite into it with a crunch. "Especially when he's been spending so much time on his own, on that laptop, looking up things on a browser I don't recognize."

"Just…a new browser, what's weird about that?" I asked with a scowl. "And why are you ruining your appetite with chips? I told you the stew would be done soon."

"This might amaze you, but I'm capable of eating a little something now, then eating a lot of something later," he said, walking around the couch. He wasn't going to let the subject drop easily as he stared at me.

I rolled my eyes. "I thought even military metabolisms slowed down once you got over twenty-five."

"Your food isn't going to make me fat," he said as he sat on the couch. He'd been here long enough to check the cushion before dropping down so he didn't squash a cat. "Now, why were you looking up random guys?"

"I wasn't looking up random guys," I said as I grabbed the computer. Only to watch it disappear before my eyes and find its way onto his lap. "Kai!"

Instead of confusion on his face, I watched his lips thin. "The dark web? I didn't even know you knew what that was."

"A lot of people know what it is," I said, yanking the computer back and closing the lid. "You hear about it all the time."

"You hear about how it's this dangerous place where you can order drugs, weapons, sell people and look up child porn. The news only talks about that."

"Yeah, and if you listen to other people, you'll know there are other things there, too. Plus, what's wrong with drugs? What people put into their body?—"

"Is their business," he finished wearily. "I know the argument, and you know I don't care if you occasionally have a bit of fun. It's your life. It's the other things you can get access to there that worry me."

I glared at him. "What the fuck is that supposed to mean? That I'm looking up kids or snuff videos? Jesus, Kai, just because?—"

"You didn't suddenly lose all sense of morality or who you are because you stabbed the fuck out of some scum bag who should have been offed years ago," he said with a roll of his eyes, his tone testy.

"Then what are you so worried about? I'm clearly not looking up anything illegal," I told him, a little mollified by his understanding of me.

His eyes burrowed into mine for several heartbeats before he sighed. "It wouldn't be all that hard to find someone willing to kill a few guys for you for the right price."

I blinked. "You…think I'm looking up hitmen?"

"?"

"Well, I'm not."

"Then you're doing something so much worse."

"What could be worse?"

"You're looking up all the information you can find on them."

"Okay?"

"Why would you need that kind of information? And why would you need all that information on a front and back loaded program to ensure the searches aren't traced back to you?"

"It does sound suspicious when you put it like that."

Kai took a deep breath, leaning forward to put the can of Pringles on the table in front of the couch. "Are you…thinking of going after the other three?"

I stared at him, remembering when we were growing up and how people had treated him. They had seen this big kid who didn't talk much, who only grew to be bigger and still didn't talk all that much. They'd seen his muscles and strong features and didn't hear his voice, so they automatically assumed he was stupid. And, like then, he was sitting near me and proving exactly how wrong those people were. This man was smart .

I slid the computer onto the table as well and sighed. "I'm just looking."

"Damn it," he muttered under his breath. "?—"

"Don't, okay?" I said with a huff, flinging myself back onto the couch and crossing my arms over my middle. "I know, alright? It's an awful thing to consider. It's taking the law into my own hands. It's getting more blood on my hands and tainting my soul, and so on and so forth."

I couldn't say that trying to find those three and kill them would be something I was even capable of. It was one thing to be cornered in an alley by one of the four who proved to be a threat to my life. It was something else entirely to hunt down three people and end their lives.

And yet?—

Yet a part of me had woken up that night and hadn't gone back to sleep. The part of me that could still feel their hands on me, feel them inside me . The part that wouldn't let me forget how they had raped me while my love had been dying only feet away. The part of me that had rumbled and stirred under every bit of misery, terror, and sorrow. Now, it had crawled from the pit it had been locked away in my whole life and was hungry.

It wanted me to continue what I had accidentally started last night. Those four men had grown into bigger-than-life monsters when, in reality, they were just the regular kind of monsters. And now I wanted to become a monster slayer.

He let out a soft little laugh. "Those are all the things I should be saying to you. I know that."

"Should be?"

"Should be."

"But you're not."

He sighed heavily. "I'm sure you haven't forgotten the story I told you about the village and the informant."

"What, is this where I should say you should point out that there's a difference between you and me? Or that you were in the military in some foreign place, surrounded by enemies, and I'm not?"

"You could."

"Would it make a difference?"

"I don't know."

Kai sighed deeply and leaned back on the couch as well. I couldn't help but smile when his orange shadow appeared and jumped in his lap, and Kai absently placed his hand into the cat's fur and rubbed gently. "It's…I don't know how to say this?—"

"So just say it and quit trying to find the right way."

"It's more that I just…there's so many things going on in my head I'm finding it impossible to explain everything. It would just be a mish-mash of words and ideas, and none of it would make sense."

"I know the feeling. I felt like that for two years. Every time I wanted to talk about it, I found myself stumbling in my head and falling flat on my face."

"How'd you fix it?"

"Funnily enough, it was talking to you."

"What'd I do?"

"Exist."

He stilled for a moment, and a complicated flurry of emotions passed through his eyes. It wasn't quite the intensity I'd seen on the dance floor at the weekend, but it was certainly burning. I'd never had him look at me like he was unbelievably touched by what I said and simultaneously wanted to press me into the couch.

"Are you…planning on doing anything anytime soon?" he asked me softly.

"I…no. I don't even know if I'm planning anything. I'm toying with the idea of planning something."

His eyes drifted to the computer. "Where are you saving the information? A cloud?"

"No, thumb drive. Had to find an encryption program for that, which took half a day to dig up."

"For encryption software?"

"To find one that probably isn't full of malware."

"Ah…sometimes I forget that you were always good with computers. And numbers."

"And people."

He snorted. "All three that I struggled with."

"You weren't bad on computers," I said with a chuckle. "You just, uh…have that weird curse."

For whatever reason, electronic devices went completely crazy whenever Kai operated them. The device could work flawlessly from the moment it was turned on and continued to operate flawlessly. When Kai decided to use it, the chances of something going wrong went up with every use. Over the years, I'd watched computers, tablets, phones, two Game Boys, three Mp3 players, and once a pacemaker go completely to shit around him.

"Which is why I don't touch them," he said, then frowned. "Hopefully, I didn't screw up your computer."

"I'm sure it'll be fine," I said, a little uneasy, but I didn't want to rub it in. "Plus, maybe it's petering out. Your phone has lasted. It's the same one you had the last time you were back here."

He snorted. "I think I just happened to find the one device that's more stubborn than me."

"Now, that would be an achievement worth noting."

"True."

He continued to stroke Clem, who, for all appearances, was the happiest critter in the world. If Kai thought he would get away with leaving the cat behind when he finally found a place to stay, he had another think coming. I was pretty sure Clem would find a way to break out of here and hunt Kai down. I didn't know if that was Kai's normal effect on cats or if this was just the fact that sometimes a cat found a person, and they were the chosen one, and there was nothing anyone could do to change that.

I had to snort as I realized what we'd done. "Jesus."

"What?" he asked, looking up in confusion.

"We managed to switch from me potentially planning to become fucking John Wick to talking about your bad luck, and I'm over here now thinking about cats and their weird ways," I said with a shake of my head. If anything, he should be questioning what the hell was wrong with me that I thought this was even remotely a good idea. And I should be asking why he wasn't trying to talk me out of it or talking about how it was wrong to hunt people down to kill them.

"If it makes you feel any better, I was thinking about that night."

"I think that's when all this started."

He ducked his head slightly and smirked. "I was referring to the kiss. Not anything else."

"I…oh."

"And the fact that you said me doing that was something you'd dreamed of doing because you've always had a thing for me."

"I…did I?"

"You did."

"Oh. Wow…that's fucked up."

"How so?"

"It took me brutally killing my twice failed attempted murderer for me to finally find the courage to tell you I've been into you since we were like…ten."

His eyes widened. "Ten?"

The shock on his face was so genuine and frank I couldn't help but laugh, which only made him scowl. "I'm sorry! You just…looked so bug-eyed, is all. It wasn't like I was having dirty thoughts or anything like that. I was ten. But I sometimes thought about kissing you and holding your hand."

It was his turn to chuckle. "Christ, how did you end up having innocent thoughts like that? Even I knew what sex was at ten."

"Well, yeah, so did I. The number of times I accidentally caught my parents in the act was way too high."

"Oh…gross, I forgot about that."

"But at ten, even when you know about sex, you don't like…have those feelings. Not really. They show up like wanting to kiss the person you like, but not in the same way you learn to kiss someone when you're older."

"Or hold their hand."

"Yeah, exactly."

"Ten, huh?" he said with a slight smile. "Alright, that's…kind of nice."

I turned so I could look at him directly. "On the other hand, I never once knew you suspected you were into guys. When the fuck were you planning on telling me you were into dick?"

He looked like a little boy caught trying to steal candy from the bowl. "Well…because the only guy I was ever really into was you."

"Seriously?" I asked, wrinkling my nose. "There's no other guy that you were into…ever?"

"Not romantically."

"Wait, so you wanted to fuck guys, but you didn't want to date them."

"Basically."

"Yeah, I knew a few guys like that," I said wryly. "Except they were married, had a family, and liked to get away from the family every once in a while to get their rocks off."

"Well, I didn't do that."

"That didn't seem your style."

He frowned. "Well…there was Logan, I guess."

"Wait," I said, remembering that name and thinking. "Wasn't that your squad buddy who died?"

"Yeah, we uh…had a thing. It was mostly sexual, and we kept it quiet."

"Of course you did."

"First of all, that was when Don't Ask, Don't Tell was still around. I mean, I'm sure no one would have told on us. It wasn't like we were the only ones comforting each other."

I made sure not to snort at the use of comfort, if only because I didn't have the humor of a fourteen-year-old, and it was becoming evident that Logan had been important to him. "So you guys just…had sex?"

"And…other things."

"I think blowjobs are covered under sex."

He smiled faintly. "I meant we did other things that weren't sexual. We spent a lot of time around one another, ate together, tried to make sure we patrolled together. And whenever we could make it look normal for us to share a bunk or tent, we did that too…without the sex stuff."

"Sounds to me like I'm not the only guy you were ever romantically interested in," I told him softly.

"Yeah, well…I never got the chance to talk to him about that," Kai said with a shrug. "I kept meaning to, but something always seemed to get in the way, and it was usually my head. I didn't wanna screw up a good thing while I had it, even if I thought there could be more if I took the chance."

"And then the chance was gone," I said with a sigh.

"Yeah."

"I'm sorry. I really am."

"I know, but that was…Jesus, a decade ago. I've had time to work through how I felt. And I knew I couldn't keep kicking myself over it. Maybe, in some fucked up way, I spared myself more pain by not letting things go deeper. It would have been way worse to lose him after that."

"I guess," I said, feeling slightly sad for them. Kai had never had the chance to figure out if it was something he wanted, and Logan had died without knowing someone like Kai could care about him like that. As someone who had known Kai since we were in single digit ages, I knew how special it was to be cared for and even loved by him. Hopefully, if there was an afterlife, Logan had figured that out after he'd died and maybe was kicking himself for not saying something.

"Want to know something else fucked up?" Kai asked, looking wary for the first time since we'd changed topics.

"What's that?" I asked, wondering if I should be worried.

"After Logan died, I decided I wouldn't make the same mistake with you. Told myself that when I got back from that deployment, I was going to fess up about how I'd felt about you for years. And whatever you said, however you reacted, I was going to deal with it like I tried to deal with all my other problems," he said, giving a wry twist of his lips. "But you know, life had other plans."

I frowned, trying to remember back then, and grunted. "Chris."

"Yeah, you were dating Chris when I got back. And you two broke up right before I left."

"You could have told me then."

"I was not going to tell you I'd been holding a torch for you when you'd just broken up with your first serious boyfriend. Jesus, talk about swooping in from the wings."

I laughed at that. "You probably should have. If only because it would have pissed Chris off."

"Really?"

"Oh, yeah. I kept it from you, but the guy was so stupidly jealous of you. Kept insisting you weren't straight and that you were waiting to grab me for yourself."

"Well, he was half right."

I smiled at that. "And he was wrong about the kind of person you were…obviously. Even when the opportunity presented itself, you didn't take it. You went back overseas without saying a word."

"And then I came back just in time for you to have been dating Derek for a couple of years."

"And then broke up right before you came back. So once again, you decided to hold back."

"And that's when you ended up?—"

I sighed, touched by his gentleness that seemed so at odds with his rough exterior and completely exasperated. "You can say it. That's when I met Lucas."

"Yeah," he said. "He was the first one I ever really hated."

"Really? Even Chris? I thought you hated him."

"Chris was a control freak with jealousy issues and an ego that could have formed its own landmass if it was let loose."

"You do have a way with words."

"Lucas was…Lucas was a good guy. It was obvious he was perfect for you, and I could tell he was crazy about you even when you were purposefully slowing things down so you didn't repeat the mistakes of the past. I also knew you wanted to push past that worry and charge ahead, but you kept holding back. He waited for you, let you make him wait, and I knew once you went long enough, the two of you would be together forever."

As much as I'd told him he didn't have to hold back, his words sent a pang through my chest. "Yeah, well, like you said, life had other plans."

"I never wanted that…for either of you."

"Jesus, Kai, I know that. I know you didn't want that to happen to him."

"I know I just…I hated him because he was perfect for you, and I saw the thin thread of a chance ever to speak the truth disappear. And I mean, hell, it was like I told myself then, if it was going to disappear, I'd definitely choose it happening because you'd found the perfect guy."

"He was perfect," I said with a weak smile. "And you know, it's because of you and your choices that I even got with him and all the others in the first place."

"Huh?"

"Kai, if I'd thought for even a moment that I had a chance to try with you, I would have held onto that with a death grip," I said with a low chuckle, pulling lightly at one of the threads on my jeans. "But I had it in my head that you were straight and my best friend. Hell, if I'd known you were even into guys, that would have been enough. So, you keeping those secrets, let me go out and start dating. I guess, in a way, it worked against you in more ways than one."

"And because of my choices, I helped what happened to you and Lucas," he said in a low voice.

"No," I said immediately. "That had nothing to do with you. If you're responsible for that, then I'm just as responsible. I was the one who kept talking to those guys. I was the one who ignored Lucas's wariness and pulled him into that mess. I was the one who wanted to follow them for an afterparty. And I've already spent a long time blaming myself, when the real choices that night were made by?—"

By the monsters who had stolen more from me than I ever thought was possible to take from a person. There were whole aspects of my life completely and utterly changed that would never go back to what they were because of those four men. Well, now one of them was dead and never going to hurt another person, never horrifically change their life in ways that would haunt them.

It was something all of them deserved. Lucas had spent two years in the ground, and I had spent two years dead in spirit and then desperately trying to put myself into functioning order. And what had they done? What had they suffered? A little bit of ‘harassment' from the cops until money traded hands and calls were made? And then it was right back to their silver spoon lives where they could be the monstrous devils they wanted to be to their heart's content.

No, it wasn't right, and it said so much about the world that cruel injustice could happen without so much as a whimper from anyone…except me.

Well, maybe it didn't have to be a whimper.

"Okay," Kai said gently, reaching across the space between us to lay a hand on my knee and squeeze it. "I can see it on your face. Don't get worked up."

"Kind of hard not to," I said with a snort, looking away from him while trying my best to get my emotions under control. Along with a newfound sense of justice came a significant amount of anger. I wasn't exactly a stranger to anger, you didn't grow up in an angry household with anger constantly directed at you without picking up a few things along the way.

This was different, though, something altogether unfamiliar. I had never known the anger inside me to feel…constant. It would flare to life before I eventually tamped it down and made it behave. Now though? Now, it lived constantly in my head, always moving and slithering around like a dragon, ready to pounce at the slightest provocation.

But Kai didn't deserve it, he wasn't the cause of my newly emboldened rage, and I needed to get myself under control. I was too used to quickly getting myself under control, and if I didn't get that back, I would lose my grip at the worst possible moment. I needed to learn how to control this new rage before deciding how to proceed.

"Sorry," I said, glad he'd given me a moment to control myself. "That uh…that's new."

He smiled at that. "It's different, isn't it? After what happened the other day?"

I looked up in surprise, only to scoff. "Of course, you know what I'm talking about. If there were anyone who could claim to know me that well, it would be you."

"Well, yeah," he said with an almost shy smile. "But it's also that I've been there. I know what it's like to have something…well, like you said, break inside me."

"A door," I said with a frown.

"And it's a messy, ugly, but sometimes necessary thing behind that door," he said, his brow furrowing. "I never wanted you to see what was behind that door, not in yourself anyway."

"Yeah, well, maybe that was pretty much a doomed hope from the start," I said with a shrug. "Maybe it was supposed to happen this way."

"Be careful thinking about what is or isn't supposed to happen," he warned with a wince. "You never know where that particular road will lead."

For a moment, I didn't realize what he meant until he looked away, guilt flashing over his face, and my chest squeezed uncomfortably. Of course, if all things were meant to happen for a reason, then maybe the universe had sent me back to that alley and delivered the dealer to me so I could find closure and perhaps some bloody vengeance. But that also opened up the idea that I had been meant to go through that awful thing and for Lucas to die. And for what? So I could suffer and contemplate the idea of getting vengeance? For the possibility of realizing my long-standing wish to be with Kai?

"Yeah," I said softly. "I, uh, think I know what you mean. Maybe I should stick with just…not believing in the powers that be. That's a good way to get even more bitter."

"It can be," he said, glancing sidelong at me.

"But," I said, internally shaking myself and flashing a smile in his direction, "whatever the case is. At the very least, I get to have you in my life again, and like I said before, that kiss wasn't exactly what I'd call a bad thing."

"Hunt," he said with a frown. "It made you spiral and go walking back to the scene of the worst day of your life, and hopefully the worst day you'll ever have for the rest of your life. I wouldn't exactly call that a stellar reaction."

I could only stare at him blankly for a moment as I suddenly realized how the entire sequence of events must have looked from his perspective. Then I let out a sharp laugh and quickly covered it up when he gave me a dirty look.

"I'm sorry," I said, trying to stifle my laughter before it got out of control. The last thing I needed was to go into one of the laughing fits I used to get into when I was nervous. "I didn't realize how bad that must have looked for you. Or that I didn't explain myself afterward. I meant to."

"Well, you did have other things on your mind," he said a little begrudgingly.

Namely, the fact that I'd been attacked again and killed a man, which was still such a weird thought. Taking someone's life hadn't ranked in the top one hundred things I aspired to do or even the top thousand, but here we were. I had officially killed someone, and my rugged, tough, extremely combat-capable best friend was trying and failing, not to pout that I had forgotten to tell him the kiss he'd given me was not, in fact, bad.

"Look," I said, finally turning to face him completely. "Despite everything that happened, I didn't consider the kiss to be a bad thing."

"I don't need to ask, but you were the one who freaked out after it."

His discomfort had returned, which told me he knew full well what I'd been thinking about after he kissed me. It wasn't fair to expect him to talk about a subject as painful for me as Lucas so freely, but it was starting to get on my nerves a little.

"Well, it sounds like you already guessed, but yeah, I was thinking of Lucas after you kissed me. At first, I thought about how wonderful it was to be kissed again by someone I trusted completely. That it was you, the man I had dreamed about for so long, was just…an entirely different kind of high," I admitted, smiling when I saw him warm to the idea. "But yeah, I thought of Lucas. I thought about how he died and what was taken from us. And it felt like I was stepping all over his memory."

"I can see that," he admitted.

"But…I wasn't," I said slowly, trying to make sure I said exactly what I meant so he understood where my head was on the subject. "Or at least, that's what I halfway believe."

"Halfway?"

"Which is far less than it was a few months ago, let alone a year ago."

"Faking it till you make it?"

"I don't know. Maybe? Or maybe some things are just harder to understand than others. I can know, here," I said, tapping my head, "that it's time to move on and that I can't spend the rest of my life mourning him, no matter how ugly his death. And…I also know he would want me to move on and not hang onto him. Trust me, he would give me so much shit for sticking to things this hard."

"But your heart isn't on the same level as your head."

"No. And if it were anyone else but you, I wouldn't bother considering it at all. But it is you, so here we are."

"Here I am," he said with a shake of his head. "I wonder what Lucas would say if he knew we were having this conversation."

"For all we know, he does."

"True."

"But," I said with a shrug, "I knew him pretty well. I'd say I knew him really well, and in my opinion, I think he'd be happy."

"Would he?"

"Well, he already knew how I felt about you."

"Wait, seriously?"

"Seriously. He confronted me on it after we'd moved in together."

"Confronted you? Shit," Kai swore, looking worried. "What'd he say?"

I snorted. "He wasn't mad or anything. Wasn't all that bothered by it, actually. Even asked me if I was in love with you. I try not to think about that conversation too much, but I think he just wanted me to know that he knew and was okay with it. He never gave me the feeling that he was threatened by you or by my feelings for you."

"He never gave me that feeling either," Kai admitted with a light shrug. "He was always fine with me. Never tried to push for friendship but…then again, maybe with what he figured out, he didn't want to be?—"

"Too close to you, just in case I did decide to ditch him to run off with you?" I asked dryly.

The corner of his mouth twitched. "Yeah, something like that."

"Lucas and I were a lot alike in that regard."

"Huh?"

"He wasn't the type to stick by something if he thought it wasn't going to work. Just like I was able to deal with my feelings for you all these years because I assumed there was no chance, he would have left if he thought there was ever a chance I'd leave him. He was in it to win it, and nothing would keep him from his happy ending if he could stop it."

It was the quiet confidence with which Lucas managed it that had always reminded me of Kai. Of course, everyone had a mental landscape that others couldn't glimpse, where parts of you that you kept hidden came out to play. Kai wasn't nearly as confident as he seemed, but he was often more confident than me, and Lucas had been the same.

I remember hearing that young girls looked to their fathers when choosing a boyfriend and boys to their mothers. It had made sense that gay boys like me would look to their fathers. Yet when it came to the man I'd fallen in love with and tried to spend my life with, I had looked to my best friend, the only healthy male role model I had known growing up.

"Look," Kai said after a long silence, "I understand this is difficult for you. Beyond difficult. After everything that happened when Lucas died and you…" His face gave a noticeable twitch and then stilled. I recognized the sign of him feeling something strongly but tamping it down. It was one I hadn't seen in a long time, not since the military had drilled even more control into him. "And then, after what happened the other day. You've got a lot going on."

I sighed, nodding my head in agreement. "But I don't think that's going to change anytime soon. I've got a business to run, a house to keep up, errands to run, a fucked-up childhood, a new horrible thing to add to the mix after the attack, blood on my hands, and a temptation to bring that sort of justice to those that hurt me in ways no one should ever have to be hurt. But life always has things to keep you busy."

His eyes met mine, and I knew he wondered if he should address that last tidbit. I knew he was still thinking heavily about what he had ‘discovered' I'd been up to. He hadn't tried to stop me, but I knew he was thinking through everything he'd learned. Soon, I would find out his views, and in the meantime, I would keep doing what I was doing.

I waited for him to speak, to choose how he was going to deal with everything I'd said, including my outright admission to the plots in my head. The worry on his face told me how bothered he was by my thoughts, but I didn't know if that was because he was worried about how dangerous or morally dubious it was, the potential legal trouble, or other issues.

After a moment, he finally smiled. "So, had a major thing for me, huh?"

I let out a laugh that was both amusement and relief. "Well, yeah. Big strong best friend who was always there for me and looked good in more or less clothing? Kind of hard not to be into you."

"Oh, okay," he said with a little laugh, ducking his head in what I thought might be mild embarrassment.

"The real question is how you looked at some scrawny kid, wearing clothes that never fit him right, usually sporting a new bruise or cut, and said, ‘Yeah, that's the person I want,'" I said with a snort.

He cast a sidelong glance at me before shaking his head. "It was…well, I had my reasons."

"Oh, that's lovely and vague," I said with a snort, leaning back against the couch since it seemed like the prospect of discussing my plans had been dropped. "And gives me that oh-so-fuzzy feeling."

"How's this for a warm and fuzzy feeling?" he said, his eyes locking onto mine and holding as he spoke. Even if I'd wanted to pull my eyes away, I wouldn't have been able to, as the intensity from before had returned. "How about this weekend, I take you out?"

"What? Again?" I asked with a nervous laugh. It wasn't like I thought something else was going to happen, but that didn't change my nervousness about the idea.

He opened his mouth, closed it, and scowled at me. "Maybe we could avoid talking about what happened and focus on my idea."

"Right, of course," I said, abashed and feeling a twinge of guilt for the reminder. "Go on, your idea."

"If you're willing to…try again," he said, giving away his nervousness with a hard swallow and a flicker of a smile. "I'd like to try properly."

"Try what?"

"Well, as much fun as we were having, and as much as you supposedly wanted it, I feel bad about how the kiss happened. I'd like the chance to put us in a situation where it's much more, I don't know…suitable?"

"Suitable?" I wondered, suspecting I knew what he meant and feeling a flutter of butterflies in my stomach but still very much wanting to hear him say it outright. If I was going to have one of my many fantasies finally come true, I was going to milk every last bit.

His smile was knowing, as if he understood what I was doing, but he drew himself up and gave me a warm smile. "I'm asking you out on a date. You and I get dressed up, and I take you somewhere we would have never dreamed of being able to afford. We have some good food. We talk, have a couple of drinks, and talk about whether we're going to your place or mine."

I laughed. "Which would make me ask whether you think I'm that kind of date."

"And I tell you that whatever date you are, I've had a good time and want to see you again either way."

I grinned. "Very smooth. One might think you've done this before."

"Not in a while," he said with a grunt.

"Or with a guy."

"Or with someone as important to get it right with so early on as it will be with you."

I wasn't going to tell him no from the moment I realized what he wanted to ask me. It wasn't like I required attention to show how important I was to someone, but hearing just one honest, vulnerable statement was worth thousands of daily ones.

"I think it's safe to say you've won me over," I said with a laugh. "How nice are you thinking?"

"Nice. We'll need to dress up."

"Mmm, a suit?"

"Probably. I'll have to make a few calls and see what I can do in a week."

"Geez, how fancy are we talking?"

"Suit fancy."

"That doesn't narrow it down much. There's quite a few places in the city that require suits."

"Well," he said, pushing to his feet. "I suppose I should probably start doing some research, shouldn't I?"

"I imagine you should," I said, eyes flitting to the curve of his ass before hastily returning to his face. If we were to play this like a proper date, I would have to start behaving appropriately. Well, for a little while anyway, between the kiss and now the offer of a ‘proper' date, I could feel an entirely different door opening in my mind. The kind that would rewrite how I looked at him, tearing down the walls and fail-safes I'd placed in my head over many years.

"And don't think I didn't see you just check out my ass," he said as he left the room, allowing me a moment to see the grin on his face before he disappeared around the corner.

"Wear a little less clothing, and I'll check a few other things out," I muttered as I picked up my laptop, opened it, and stared at the screen momentarily before closing the program.

I had a few other things on my mind that were more important.