7. Rafe

Rafe

T he polite smile never leaves her face. It doesn't slip when her dad talks to Gideon like he's Mason. It doesn't slip when Jeraldine glides gracefully away without so much as a goodbye or good luck. She keeps it up with all the skill and perfection that speaks of hundreds of hours of agonising practice. What bothers me the most is how these people, who are so close to her, don't see the pain in her eyes.

I see it. Dane sees it. Gideon knows her better than any of us do, and his slightly shifting of his body, setting him closer to her, indicates that he knows.

I keep my eyes away from Gideon, partly because I'm afraid my expression will give me away, and because there's a tiny part of me that feels off kilter. Dane has embraced Gideon in Mason's skin with no hesitance, but for me, there are a lot of feelings tied up in all of it, and there's no one I can speak to. I'm not even sure what I'd say if I could.

Hey, my name's Rafe, and I'm struggling with the issue that there's a ghost in the skin of an acquaintance of ours. A family friend with a much older, prior claim to my girlfriend, and both he and said ghost have more of a relationship with the girl I'm in love with than I do. Oh, and she doesn't know yet that the ghost is actually my brother Terrance, who her ex-boyfriend murdered years before when they kissed. Yeah…I don't think anyone would believe this story.

I think they'd put me in a padded room. In this town, it's possible.

I glance at her again and away when her eyes widen in question. We have to tell her. It's not right to keep this from her. I put my hand against my stomach, trying to ease the roiling, but it doesn't help.

"Pull it together," Dane growls under his breath.

I jerk my arm away from him and glare. "Leave me alone, Dane."

Dane stiffens, probably in shock. I feel bad, but I'm too tied in knots over everything that's rushing through my head. I step back from the group, drawing the eyes of Gideon, Jax, Dane, and Eddie.

"I have a meeting I can't reschedule," I blurt out.

There's a beat of silence. Jax searches my face, but I give up nothing.

"I'll come with you."

I turn my head and glare at Gideon. "No, thanks. I'll be fine."

"It's okay, I don't mind, it'd be nice to get out."

No words spring to mind to stop him. The last thing I want to do right now is go anywhere with him. But I can't answer the questions Jax and Eddie might ask. So, I give a short nod and turn away.

***

I stare through the windshield and try to ignore the quiet that he's so damn comfortable in. I'd half expected him to start asking me questions, demanding answers, but he got in the car, rested his hands on his thighs, tilted his head back, and let me suffer in the silence. Just like he always did, he knows it drives me mad .

Dane might have the temper, but mine is slower and no less hot a burn, and right now, I'm alight. The tension in the air between us is so thick I'm surprised we can still breathe.

My hands shake as I steer the car into an empty parking lot and switch the ignition off. I slam my body back against the seat and then reach for the door handle.

"Don't!"

I hesitate, turning to glare at Gideon. "Don't tell me what to do."

"Just wait, let's talk." Gideon leans forward, reaching out to touch me, hesitating when I flinch. He sits back with a loud exhale that turns some of the anger inside me to guilt.

I grit my teeth and stare out the windshield. "This is weird, and I need time."

Gideon tenses but doesn't say anything, which just increases my guilt and fuels the rage.

"It's weird, Terry, or Gideon, or Mason, whoever you are. It's weird, and this secret-keeping thing is fucked up. She has been lied to and gaslit enough. That's what I'm really pissed about. The lying to her. We should be her safety."

"She's not ready to know yet."

My lip curls as I turn to face him. "You don't get to decide what people deserve to know. And while we're there, how about a little truth? What happened to you? How did you meet her? You fell in love? How did you end up dead? Where's your body?" I throw question after question at him. "When were you going to introduce us? Why was it all secret? What the actual fuck, Terrance?"

"First off, call me Gideon." His glare softens, those familiar eyes tracing slowly over my face. He's looking at me with that old fondness that I used to love .

"I can't. You're in Mason's body," I snap back. "You're Mason now, Terrance, Terry, Gideon, Mason!" I shout and punch the steering wheel.

Gideon's eyelid twitches, which is weird because it's exactly how Terry would look when I pushed him too far.

"My memories of my life before are hazy. I don't remember most events, I remember feelings and people. Hmm, I remember meeting you and Dane and our lives together, but I can't remember dying. I don't know where my body is. Though I do remember looking at Louis when it happened. I wish I did."

My anger fades away. What would it feel like to know your body is lying out there unfound, while your killer wanders free? What would it be like to be inside a body that isn't your own?

"We have to tell her, Gideon," I say with exhaustion. "Trust me on this. She needs to know."

"I think I know what she needs better-"

"Do not even finish that sentence!" I thunder, whirling on him. "You were dead, a ghost. You weren't there all the time, and even when you were, you weren't in this realm. Gideon, you don't get to say you know her better."

The tension in the car is so thick I think it might catch fire. My anger pulses at my temple, and out of the corner of my eye I catch sight of two homeless people watching avidly. The car park is empty, and when I narrow my eyes; they hold up their hands, turn, and walk away, leaving us alone again. Hurricane is turning me into something to be frightened of; I don't know how to feel about that.

Gideon licks his lips and looks away. "You're right. I'm sorry." He pushes open the car door and puts one leg out. The rush of fresh air takes the tension with it. "I wonder sometimes if she will look at you and Dane and want me to go."

His words startle me .

"Will she be able to tell me to go if she no longer wants me around?" Gideon murmurs. "When she falls in love-"

"She is in love," I say sharply.

Gideon looks at me, startled. "No, I mean the way she was with Louis-"

I sit forward, furious with him. So furious I could kick his ass! "She is!" I stress the words, dragging it out.

Gideon blinks twice. His face transforms, his expression turning to something akin to wonder. "It's real. When she says it to us, it's real? She means it?"

I shake my head and frown at him. "I thought you knew her? Of course, it's real."

"She doesn't know me."

I roll my eyes. "You're the ghost she wouldn't give up. I think she knows you well enough." I open my door and get out of the car, wandering around the empty lot until I've got a hold of my emotions again. When I turn back, Gideon is there, leaning on the car, his eyes on me.

The expression is familiar and cracks open the wounds I thought had healed.

"I'm sorry I left you."

Everything inside me goes still. I didn't know I needed to hear the words until he said them. I didn't know I felt that way until he said it. Anger slides away, revealing pain. Raw pain.

"It wasn't your fault," I mumble.

"I had a secret that I kept from you, when we had promises to never keep secrets. I am sorry, Rafael."

My fingers clench as I remember the months before he passed, his strange silences, the way he kept disappearing, refusing to tell us anything. He pulled away. It hurt. Dane and Gideon's arguments would ring in the empty rooms long after he'd left. I'd stuffed everything down, not allowing myself to think or remember .

When he was gone, the guilt ate Dane alive. It ate me alive. The not knowing, the wondering what had happened. The see-saw between anger and anguish. And all combined with an inability to move on, just two broken brothers frozen in time.

"You broke trust with us. You went missing, and you got killed, and we had no idea!" My voice rises until I'm shouting. I embrace the anger so I don't have to feel that ache.

Gideon moves closer until we're standing almost toe-to-toe. "I did all those things. It was wrong. I was wrong. We were family. And," I see the moment he realises that what he did to us back then is similar to what he's doing to her now.

I see the moment in his eyes when he realises that he can't keep secrets, not anymore.

Something inside me relaxes. The fear, the anger fades, not completely gone, but settling enough that I can look at him without wanting to hit him.

His arms come around me, pulling me to his hard chest. I bury my face in his neck, tears running down my face and being absorbed into his shirt. We stay like that for a long time.

I pull back, wiping my eyes and avoiding eye contact. For a moment there, I forgot that he looks like this now. It's going to take some getting used to.

"Why is Dane so okay with me? I thought he'd be the madder of the two." Gideon chuckles and leans back on the car.

I shrug. "I suspect he compartmentalizes his feelings. It will probably come out at some point, and you'll turn around, and he'll hit you out of the blue."

Gideon laughs. "So some things haven't changed?"

I look down at my hands. "Some things have. I'm not going to step aside. Not for you. Not for Dane. I love her, and I want to be with her."

Gideon's eyebrows rise up. "Did I suggest you need to? "

I shake my head. "I'm not jealous, this isn't jealousy, this is acknowledging that you have a prior claim and letting you know that I love that woman so much I would take a bullet for her. Jax is exceptional. I love her, Gideon, and I'm going to fight to be with her."

Gideon studies me for a long moment and then steps to the side. I realise with a start that he won't fight me. He opens the door and gestures to the car.

"We existed in a relationship with her before. Has she indicated she wants monogamy?"

I shake my head. "No-"

"I know her. I got to know her. She's terrified of being in a relationship with one person, of falling into someone's life the way Louis did to her, and she's lonely. I think this relationship between the four of us might be one that appeals. It's safer with more. Her heart has been so lonely. I remember everything about her so clearly. You, Dane, and her. The memories that Mason had and I have of you, are crystal clear. They haven't faded."

I consider this and throw the keys at him. He catches them out of the air and goes to the driver's seat.

"So this meeting?"

"Making sure our home is fit for living," I explain. "I didn't realise we'd be going back tonight, and I'd like it to be ready."

Gideon nods. "Good idea."

I sit stiffly in the passenger seat. "There's a room for you."

His fingers twitch. "You were that certain you would find me?"

"Of course. We were never giving up on you, ever."

A rainbow haze bursts across the road in front of us, and Gideon eases his foot off the accelerator.

"The spirits are restless and growing more so," Gideon says, and the hairs on my neck raise .

"Yes, we've seen a lot more activity. Luckily, there are only a few in the Harmon household."

"It's strange. I feel the same restlessness that is coursing through them, but I can't put my finger on what's wrong," Gideon murmurs. "They know something."

"He's coming, isn't he? Louis is coming for her?"

Gideon glares as he pulls into the car park outside our loft. "Oh, he's already here, laying in wait. He's too smart, too intelligent. He's planned for everything. I don't know why he's waiting, probably for her. But he's here and ready."

I shudder. "He's going to come after her now, to take her or kill her."

"He needs her to be alive, where he can have an audience, get her opinion. Louis won't kill her, he needs her, she's the only one who gets him. He will kill us, without hesitation, without mercy."

I open my house and walk inside, pausing in the entrance as the scent of something fetid seers my senses. Bile rushes up my throat, and my mouth fills with saliva.

"What is that?" Gideon shoulders past me and pauses. "Oh, fuck."

I swallow hard, torn between wanting to look and contemplating backing away and setting the whole loft on fire.

In the end, I feel like I need to know, I have to see. I shift my weight and lean around Gideon. My eyes widen, and bile rushes up my throat, pushing into my mouth. I swallow it down, my eyes still caught on the horrific display.

"What is that?" I ask.

"I think it was a rabbit," Gideon murmurs. "Or a couple of them."

I gag on the smell and grip Gideon's shirt. "Fuck."

Gideon lurches forward, snatching up a piece of paper on the coffee table. I look over his shoulder at the writing.

"Outstaying your welcome is the epitome of uncouthness. You have two weeks to pack your belongings and get out of my town." Gideon chuckles. "This is good."

"How so?"

"He knows we're here. We have his attention. Louis only pays attention to those he considers threats."

"And this is good?" I say in horror.

"Yes. Because, now, a man who's afraid might make mistakes."

My eyes widen. Gideon claps me on the shoulder.

"Let's get this house ready for our queen so we can come home tonight."