Chapter 19

19

LINCOLN

I watch helplessly as Asher flees the room without so much as a backwards glance, the bubble that just encircled the three of us now completely burst, and I feel an ache forming in my chest. Did I push him too far? Was it not enough? When it comes to him I can never seem to make the right move, and when I focus back on Logan, I know he feels the same. What just happened between us can't be taken back. We can't just uncross the line and go back to normal. No, things have changed, whether Asher Donovan pretends they haven't or otherwise. There is no undoing what we just did, not now that we know what he looks like when he is falling apart for us.

"Fuck, do you think we should go after him?" Logan asks, a note of worry and despair staining his tone, and I know he will feel this deeper than I do, but I am already shaking my head.

"No, he needs time to process his feelings," I tell him, pulling up my pants and tucking myself away. With Asher's confessions from the plane still in my ear, and what just happened here, I can barely even think straight.

I thought he wanted this, that he needed this, but what if I was wrong? What if I just forced him into something exactly like his fat her used to?

"But we can tell him it's fine, that things don't have to change if he doesn't want them to," Logan pleads, the desperation pouring off him in waves, as he slides off the table and grabs his clothes.

"Things aren't fine," I shout, surprising both of us. "Nothing that has ever happened to Asher Donovan is fine, so if he needs some space then we will give it to him." Logan's eyes widen in confusion, and I have to inhale a deep breath to calm my racing heart, as he buttons his shirt. "Elliot got to him," I start quietly, not letting myself spill Ash's secrets to Logan until he is ready for him to have them. "He's just as damaged and fucked up as the rest of us, and he needs to figure out what he wants."

Logan watches me silently as I fix my suit, erasing the sex we just had from my attire, before he runs a hand through his hair and closes the distance between us. "Are we still good?" He asks quietly, his stare searching mine for a silent answer. "You know, whatever just happened with Ash, it doesn't change anything with us, right?"

For the first time ever, I see a sense of vulnerability in him and it guts me, so much so that I can't stop myself from grabbing him and pulling him in close. "Nothing could change the way I feel about you, Lo," I admit gruffly, and his stare softens.

"Good, because you need to know, my feelings for Asher aside, I feel very much the opposite of casual about you," he says with a shy smile, and I swear I feel a heat in my cheeks that wasn't there before.

"I am starting to feel the opposite of casual about you too," I reply, trailing my lips across his jaw until I reach his ear. "Now let's go and shower, and relive the hot as fuck jerk-off session we both just witnessed."

We both come twice more before we manage to tumble into bed and find some sleep, so all in all, I'd say it was a very promisin g start to my first vacation.

The next morning we enjoy a tense breakfast, which goes unnoticed by everyone except Logan and I, and then we all decide to have a relaxing day on the beach ahead of tonight's bachelor party. With the wedding coming up tomorrow we could all use a little unwinding, which is how I find myself lounging in the sun with Logan on one side, and Marcus and Jace on the other.

Asher is conveniently keeping Cassie by his side whenever he is in our vicinity, which means the topic of last night is completely off limits. I am almost certain he is doing it on purpose, but I can't be too hard on him when I get to watch him play in the waves and enjoy a day with his little girl.

"I don't know what I did to deserve this life, but fuck I can't wait to marry that girl tomorrow," Marcus comments, his eyes fixed solely on his girl, and I can't help but follow his stare and take her in.

The day I came face to face with Elle King for the first time, I saw it, the darkness, the trauma, the grief, but I also saw the fight, the hunger in her for revenge. It's why I knew I could trust her. Because when I looked at her, I saw myself looking back. Looking at her now is like looking at someone else entirely. Apart from the scars across her stomach and thighs, there is no trace of her trauma. Her eyes are bright, her smile easy, and just like always she is the epitome of beauty and strength.

"Remember when you made us blow up her truck?" Jace asks dryly, his own eyes fixed on Riley, as she dances over the waves hitting her feet.

"I remember when you kissed her," Marcus snaps back, breaking his eyes away from Elle and glaring at our brother.

Jace holds his hand up in defense, "Excuse me, but I did not kiss her, she kissed me," he recalls, surprisingly accurate in what now feels like another time all together. "And only because you were b eing a total prick with that whore, Cherry."

Marcus grunts something non-committal as Logan snorts, not even opening his eyes from where he sunbathes beside me. "You're lucky Lincoln is gay or she might have decided to complete all three levels of Rebel," he teases, only increasing Marcus' frown.

"I'd make an exception for the Little King, I am her Superman after all," I whip back teasingly, making them all stare at me in surprise.

"Holy shit, we must have died and gone to hell, my brother just made a fucking joke," Jace hollers, jumping from his lounger and pouncing on top of me, layering my sweaty body with his.

"Hey, get your own boyfriend," Logan shouts, joining him in the pile on, as Marcus curses at all of us, and I note the girls and Ash now all looking our way in wonder.

"From what I hear, my brother likes two at the same time anyway," Jace replies with glee, earning him a punch in the ribs from Logan, as I chuckle beneath them both.

"Are you indulging in some group activities without me, Playboy?" Riley asks, as she approaches us, with Elle, Ash, and Cassie hot on her heels.

"Not with these two kinky fuckers," he grumbles, climbing off of us to reach her, leaving Logan laying on the sun lounger with me.

Asher's face is a blank mask as he takes in the scene with a complete lack of interest, and when I open my mouth to speak, he quickly focuses on Cassie. "Shall we go and see if we can find some sea shells?" he asks her, and she squeals in delight, before we all watch them walk away.

"Pussy," Logan mutters under his breath, and I choke out a laugh, making everyone look at us in wonder, but it's the look in Elle 's eyes that gets me.

She is looking at me like she sees something new, like I'm not the same Lincoln she has been seeing every day for the last couple of years, and it irks me. What does she see? And more importantly, why does it bother me?

Asher doesn't come back to the beach the rest of the morning, and it isn't long before Elle and Marcus go off to hunt both him and Cassie down. Riley and Jace excuse themselves to have lunch with the Deckers. So Logan and I head out to find his parents so we can catch up with them.

It's the first time I am seeing them in a while, and it's also the first time I am spending real time with them as Logan's boyfriend, something they note instantly when we rock up with our hands intertwined. Arthur's smile is gentle, as he drops his eyes to his plate, looking happy for his son, but it's Helen who surprises me most by jumping to her feet as we arrive.

"Oh there you both are, my baby boy and his boyfriend," she coos, pulling us both in for a hug, and I do my best not to stiffen beneath her affection. I'm not exactly used to parental love, and I've come to learn that these two give it out in spades.

"Relax, mom, it's not us getting married," Logan muses sarcastically. "So don't go planning our whole lives out just yet."

Helen waves him off, pulling me towards the seat facing her. "My son finally stops being a whore and I can't celebrate a little?"

I choke back a laugh and she winks at me, as she takes her seat and Arthur pulls her hand back into his. "I think what your mom is trying to say is that we are happy to see you so happy, son," he says, coming to his wife's aid, before turning his focus to me. "And it's good to see you smile too, Lincoln, my boy, happiness looks good on you."

Emotion clogs my throat as I smile and nod at their sentiments, but no words can escape me right now, and I think Logan sens es it because he slips his hand onto my thigh beneath the table and squeezes gently.

"Is everything set for tomorrow?" He asks them, swiftly changing the subject, and I couldn't be more grateful, because I'm heading into a downward spiral.

They talk back and forth about the wedding, but all I can do is sit here stirring in my own thoughts. What must it have been like to grow up truly loved and cared for by parents like them? To have been granted your every desire and praised for your every accolade. To have just not been scared in your own home and have dead bodies in your basement.

Thoughts that make me a complete asshole, because it's not like Logan didn't pay the highest price possible to be granted the family he now has. He doesn't talk about his birth parents much, but I know their loss shaped him the same way mine did. Losing your parents is not something you ever recover from, no matter who they were or how they treated you.

The rest of the lunch I spend in a daze barely catching what anyone is saying, yet I feel the three of them looking at me with worry. They know me well enough to know when something is off with me, and when Helen hugs me goodbye, I swear I feel her trying to radiate some of her goodness into me. Not that it would ever work.

Monsters are never good.

By the time we make it back to the room, I know an interrogation from Logan is coming, and I also know that he needs the truth, no matter how much he isn't going to like it.

"Okay what the hell is going on? You barely said two words at lunch, and you've been quiet since last night. Is this about Asher?" He asks, his eyes tracking my every move as I take a seat on the lone chair in the corner. When I still don't say anything he begins pacing, firing off question after question. "Is this because we became exclusive? Or because of what you told me about your p arents?"

I'm not sure there is an etiquette to tell someone what I need to tell Logan, so I decide the best course of action is to just come out and say it.

"I've killed people."

Logan stops in his tracks, his chest deflating with an exhale. "This is about the war?" He asks, moving towards me and dropping to his knees at my feet. "Lincoln, none of us escaped that shit unscathed, but that's in the past, we just have to try and forget and move forward."

Being surrounded by so much darkness my whole life means I sometimes forget what it's like to bathe in the sun. To have someone's light shine on your entire being until you almost feel like you could step out of the shadows. That's what being with him is like. He's a perfect sunrise on a summer day, erasing the blackness of the night, but no matter how hard he tries, I will always be left behind in the dusk.

"No, you don't understand," I start, ignoring the crashing of my heart against my ribs at the thought of revealing my true self to him. "I didn't just kill my father, that was only the start, and everything with Elle and the Donovans was just an excuse." Sweat is slick on my palms as I look down at him, waiting with bated breath for me to say something that he can somehow fix, but you can't fix something that was always meant to be broken. "Logan, I've killed so many people that I've lost count, and I've enjoyed every single minute of it. I find them, stalk them, and then kill them. Every single week since last year, I've gone out and hunted down someone new and took their life."

The silence is deafening, as Logan digests each of my words and says absolutely nothing in response, before he simply stands up and walks out.