Chapter Two

V. Chapter Two

After a full night of uninterrupted sleep and a leisurely shower, Toby feels ready to face the world, and Mike. He does, however, not expect to face Mike right this very moment, which is why he leaves the bathroom with only a towel slung around his hips, steam billowing behind him as he steps into the hotel room.

Mike is reclining against the headboard of Toby's bed. What the fuck.

The balcony door wasn't open when Toby left the room, but now it is. Sunshine is streaming in, and the light paints one half of the room in harsh colors, emphasizing the contrast between Mike's tan and the white of his shirt. He looks perfectly at ease, like there is nothing unusual about him relaxing in Toby's room.

He's studying a picture of Matt and Haley.

Toby's breath leaves him in a rush. In two big steps, he crosses the room and snatches the photo away from Mike.

"What the actual fuck, man?" he gets out. His chest feels tight, his lungs contracting around his heart. I don't know you; I don't know you; what are you doing here?

Mike straightens out of his slouch, his shoulders tense, the line of his spine rigid. "That's my question."

"The fuck you think you're doing, going through my stuff?" Toby stumbles back, clutching the picture, thinks about burning it so it can't fall into the wrong hands ever again. It was a mistake to bring it, clearly; he wanted to take a selfie of himself holding their picture in front of some beautiful sailboat because Haley loves that kind of thing, loves knowing that Toby is thinking about her even when he's halfway around the world. "This is private. Private. You've no goddamn business looking through my stuff, and if you don't—"

"Who are they?" Mike interrupts. His voice is harsh, like he's the one who's been wronged here.

"Why the fuck would I tell you?" Toby needs to force the words past the tightness squeezing down around his throat. He'll protect them, whatever the cost. There's a gun in the nightstand, another one in his suitcase. "You think I want you chasing them down? Who are you?"

"Someone who isn't cheating on a family." Expression dark, Mike rolls to his feet in one smooth motion. Toby takes a subtle step to where his suitcase sits open on the floor, and then Mike is right there, all up in Toby's space—which is when Mike's words catch up with Toby.

Cheating on a family?

"Tell me, Toby" —Mike's voice is dangerously low, and he's close, very close— "are you the kind of bastard who cheats on a family? Because that's the kind of thing I like to know about a partner."

"What the..." Toby snaps his mouth shut. He feels naked in only a towel, abruptly cold, but he won't give Mike so much as a fucking inch. "Seriously? Just who do you think—"

"You keep calling it a mistake," Mike cuts right into Toby's question. "Yeah, man, we fucked. So what?"

So what. So what.

Toby wishes he could be as indifferent as Mike, wishes he could just forget it and move on; no harm, no foul. He crumples the picture up in his fist. "Well, we shouldn't fucking have."

"Pun intended?" Mike asks with an ugly curl of his lips.

"No, fuck you. Pun not intended." Toby holds the picture close, balls his other hand into a fist against his stomach. When his wrist brushes against Mike's hip bone, they both glance down before their eyes meet. Hold. Toby's mouth feels parched.

"Feel free to elaborate." Mike's voice is still low, but the dangerous edge has softened, more of a question now. "Because I don't see the problem here."

"It's against the rules. Obviously." Toby hates that he sounds a little breathless. That doesn't mean he's dismissed the option of a knee to Mike's groin.

Mike lifts a brow. "So?"

What is wrong with him?

"Did it occur to you that the rules are there for a reason? That it's dangerous for field partners to get involved when we need to keep our heads straight?"

"That's your problem?" Mike's question comes with an incredulous upward tilt toward the end, and Toby can't believe him; cannot fucking believe him.

"It is my problem when it could be the difference between us making it out alive, or ending up as cannon fodder."

"Bit dramatic, don't you think?"

No, Toby doesn't think it is given how much he struggled with keeping his mind on the job just last night. Not that he's willing to share with the class, thanks.

"Emotional entanglements," he says slowly, and they're still too close, too personal, "interfere with rational decisions. But maybe that's not a problem for you—I'm not sure you've embraced the concept of rational decisions."

"I'm not an idiot, you know." Mike's eyes narrow, sunlight glinting on the bridge of his nose. "My point is, sex doesn't automatically impair your judgment. You just got to keep it separate."

"Sure." Toby blows out a breath through his nose. "Maybe you can do that. Maybe you really are that good at compartmentalizing, too cool for feelings and all that. Me, though? I'm not." He clears his throat and breaks eye contact, glancing over at the open balcony door. The curtains are fluttering in a soft breeze, and while it must be eighty degrees at least, Toby is still feeling a little chilly, his hair damp and all over the place. "Now, thanks for this discussion; it's been thrilling. Maybe we can talk about something pleasant now, like, say, religion? Climate change? Oh, oh!" He waves the hand with the balled-up picture. "How about Middle East politics?"

It's another long moment before Mike steps back. He sits down on the edge of the bed, silent while Toby crouches down at his suitcase.

Absently, Toby notes that his things look completely untouched even though he'd tucked the picture into a hidden pocket at the bottom—a hidden pocket within a hidden pocket, in fact, custom-made according to Toby's design. So far, none of his guinea pigs searched past the first hidden pocket.

Mike may have noticed something when he got the condoms. And if he overheard—and misunderstood—last night's conversation... Well.

"You shouldn't keep private things where someone might find them," Mike says suddenly.

"I don't expect my partner to snoop through my stuff." Toby slides the picture back into his suitcase and retrieves clean underwear, a shirt and black jeans. He isn't keen to dress in front of Mike, but then, it's nothing Mike hasn't seen before. If they're meant to continue this partnership, false modesty will be a hindrance.

Even with how this morning has gone, Toby won't ask Liu for a change. If Mike had been planning to use the picture against Toby, he'd hardly have gone around waving it in Toby's face, asking questions about cheating; he'd have snapped a picture and tracked them down to give himself some actual leverage. There's also the way Mike didn't hesitate for a second to shield two strangers with his body.

Toby trusts him. As little as he knows him, he does trust him.

"It's just never advisable." Mike scoots back on the bed, leaning against the wall with his thighs splayed wide, bare feet propped up on the mattress. Toby doesn't let his eyes linger.

"Thanks for the free lesson; I'll take it under consideration."

In all honesty, though, Mike's got a point. Mike also looks like he's settling in for the foreseeable future. Boxers in hand, Toby turns, and it's not his imagination that Mike's gaze drops, then tracks all the way up, from the towel to Toby's face. Did it get warmer in here?

"For your information" —Toby busies himself with his clothes, and at this point, he's really just stalling— "it was my brother and niece."

Mike's expression relaxes, and it just shows how tense he was before. "The one who likes vampires? Looks a bit young for it, doesn't she?"

"So I keep telling her father." Oh, to hell with it—Toby has never understood guys who are shy about changing in front of others. It's body parts; everyone's got them. He drops the towel and, his back to Mike, steps into the boxers. "Unfortunately, my brother was also a bit young to be a father, and his sense of responsibility is underdeveloped. He was one half of those teenage pregnancies that gets tongues wagging."

And unlike Matt and Toby's parents, Anne's parents abandoned their daughter. They hadn't even found it in them to show up to her funeral. Waste of space, the two of them.

After shrugging into his shirt, Toby turns around. This isn't over, not quite, but Mike's values are in the right place. That's something. It's a lot.

Mike is watching Toby's hands.

Inhaling, Toby quickly finishes buttoning up his shirt the rest of the way. Definitely warmer in here. Once he's fully clothed, he shoves his hands into his pockets and tries for a smile that Mike returns.

"Hey." Mike sits up. "We've got a couple of hours before we need to check out, and our flight's not until the afternoon. We could use the time to buy a present for your niece. I'm sure we'll come across a tourist shop willing to sell us something pink and sparkly."

Pink.

Mike did listen in on last night's phone conversation.

"I don't usually bring her presents." Toby shakes his head. He withdraws his hands from his pockets and rubs them over the denim of his pants before he picks up where he left off, avoiding Mike's clear gaze. "I don't want to lie about where and how I got them."

"Then don't lie. Just tell her it's a secret and that you will explain it to her one day, soon." Mike's tone implies it's the most obvious thing in the world. Since he doesn't know Haley, he can't possibly know just how many questions she's able to fire at Toby in a very short time span—more hits per minute than an executive assistant touch-typing, seriously.

"Soon?" Toby echoes. "Like when?"

"Whenever you're planning to retire from active field work." Mike shrugs, smiling. "By then, she should be old enough to understand that it has to be a secret. And she'll have an entirely new appreciation for the presents that you bought for her all over the world."

They're not supposed to tell anyone—now or later.

"What about you?" Toby asks. "Do you have relatives who know? Friends?"

A partner? If the way Mike reacted to the possibility of Toby cheating on a family is any indication, it would be taken for an insult. There is no need.

Mike is quiet for a few seconds, and maybe this is getting too far into personal territory. Then again, Mike went through Toby's stuff, and fair is fair. Toby keeps silent, waiting.

"Not as such," Mike says a moment later. "My sister Mary has a general idea, but no specifics."

Mary. Marianne, Margaret, Mariah—Toby stops. It's none of his business; he isn't supposed to know that Mike has a sister, and Mike isn't supposed to know Toby has a brother and a niece. They aren't supposed to know anything that isn't directly relevant to the way they work together.

Toby can never explain Mike to Matt. He isn't supposed to.

"I hate it, you know. The secrecy." Toby doesn't put much force into it because there's really no one he can blame. It just is what it is. "I know why it's necessary, and it protects us, and our families. But I hate it."

Three heartbeats pass before Mike says, "I know."

And the thing is, he probably does.

Toby opens his mouth to say something, then reconsiders and shrugs his shoulders, managing a weak smile. The sun's glare seems a bit softened, less aggressive. "Yeah, well."

Another quiet moment drags by while they're simply watching each other.

Then the corners of Mike's mouth lift. "Shopping?"

"Shopping," Toby agrees, and his chest feels a little wider, more space to breathe.

***

It's Mike who finds the snow globe.

In fact, snow globe might be the wrong term to describe a glass monstrosity filled with pink and blue glitter that whirls around the miniature plastic model of a yacht. A certain resemblance to the Liberty is undeniable, and Toby stares at it for a long second, truly impressed by how much kitsch can fit into an item the size of his palm. He turns his head to take in Mike's proud grin, the delight in his eyes.

A price of thirty-five euros is daylight robbery. Toby pays without hesitation.

They exit the crowded shop. Toby is glad to leave behind all those baseball caps with sparkling logos, ties sporting Eiffel tower symbols, and water color paintings of garish sunsets. Mike carries the snow globe under one arm.

They get overpriced ice cream at a street vendor, Toby going with vanilla and strawberry while Mike orders something blue that goes by the name of smurf. The strawberry ice cream tastes artificial, and the tiny black spots swimming in Toby's scoop of vanilla can't replace taste: it has less flavor than frozen milk. According to Mike, the main ingredient of smurf might be water-soaked chewing gum.

Toby bets this particular street vendor wouldn't recognize actual ice cream if it bit him in the ass, but they eat their cones, ice cream and all, sitting on the harbor wall, legs dangling as they look out at the port. Ships are bobbing with the small waves that roll in from the sea. The plastic-wrapped bundle that contains the snow globe is sitting between them.

"I'm sorry," Mike says at some point into the comfortable quiet that envelopes them. High above their heads, seagulls are shrieking, water lapping at the stones.

Toby swallows down frozen milk and wipes his mouth, glancing at Mike's profile. "Apology noted," he says. He pauses, considers it for a moment before he adds, "Next time I catch you snooping through my stuff, I will punch you in the nuts."

Mike's smile is brilliant and true. They almost miss their bus to the airport.

***

Somehow, Toby ends up keeping the snow globe.

He hides it in the bathroom cabinet of his new apartment and makes it up to Haley by buying her a stuffed Eskimo dog that comes up to her shoulders. She loves it, so it's a win-win situation.

The snow globe is an amusing souvenir that reminds Toby of sun-flooded horizons and a moment of peace by the sea, the sounds of lapping water. It doesn't mean anything.