Charming But Reckless (NightShade Security #5)

Chapter 21

CHAPTER 21

ARICK

I was nervous about taking Orion to the secret I had kept from him. It wasn't because I was worried that he would freak out or be angry with me.

More that I didn't know what emotion he would feel.

I only knew that he needed this. It was his right to have it. I had simply been the person to hold it while he couldn't be around to claim it.

Since I didn't want to tell Orion exactly what was going on, I spoke with Tank about coordinating our travel.

“Tell me what you need and it's yours.”

I smiled at him, appreciative of the help he was giving. “I need plane tickets back to our hometown. There's a storage unit there.”

Tank nodded as if he understood completely what I was saying. He likely did. The man's intuition was amazing. Even when he didn't say a word, you could sense that he was aware of everything going on around him. He led this team and built this company. There wasn't anything he couldn't do it seemed — except maybe commitment.

I'd heard enough of the jokes and seen his teasing flirtatious ways to know that there was something else going on when it came to long-term relationships. Something I was curious to find out more about.

That wasn't my focus right now, though. I needed to get us away from here.

“Why don't you ask Archie to watch Sol while you’re gone?” He suggested.

My eyebrows rose. “You think he'd be okay with that? We might be gone a few days.”

“I think Archie would love it. They could call it a slumber party or something. Those two have grown really close since you brought him in.”

I knew the truth behind those words because Sol was obsessed with Archie. He loved learning sign language and knowing that he could speak to Takeshi directly. He even started working on it at home by answering questions by sign instead of with words.

Orion and I always smiled and responded in kind. It was good practice for us all. Takeshi always seemed to brighten when one of us knew a new word or phrase.

This was what family was like. It's what healthy relationships looked like.

“There will be a jet waiting for you at the private airstrip. The pilot knows your names and everything. You just tell him where you're going, and he'll get you there. He'll also stick around for about three days or so. After that, I'll need to coordinate a different return.”

I shook my head. “No, three days should be plenty. Thank you for this.”

He smiled, then waved me away.

I left the room feeling lighter. With the most difficult part of the plan in place, I only had to emotionally prepare myself for what was to come.

It was hard for us to talk about the past. We had mostly avoided it in hopes that our future would be focused. At the same time, we understood that who we were was a direct reflection of everything we've been through.

Maybe if we skipped over the dark parts, we could embrace all the things that were good in our childhood.

The next day, I woke up excited for what was to come. I packed bags for me and Sol.

“Pack for a few days,” I said to Orion as I rushed around our bedroom. He smiled indulgently and did as I asked without question.

“This is part of the secret, isn't it?” he asked later once the bags were all ready to go.

“It is. I think it's one of those things you just have to see to believe.”

We got an eager Sol dropped off at Archie and Takeshi’s home. The couple was more than happy to take him in. I didn't know if they were planning to have children in the future, but with the way Archie was a natural paternal figure, it seemed a waste for them not to. Maybe they could foster together.

The man deserved to share all that love with others. My son was already a better person for all that he had received from these amazing men.

We got in the car and left their place quietly. Neither of us spoke along the drive since there wasn't really much to say. Orion wasn't typically this quiet, but I think he was trying to guess what in the world I could have as a surprise for him.

I knew that no matter what he guessed, he would be wrong. He couldn't possibly know what I had done, what I had hidden. If he did, it would be because he was psychic or something.

I drove us to the airstrip and laughed when his brows furrowed.

"We're flying somewhere," he said.

I bit my lip. "We are."

"Okay, the mystery just got a little wilder," he teased.

"Any hints?"

"Not from me."

We climbed out and were greeted by a young male flight attendant. "I'll get your bags for you, sir," he said as he pushed between us to grab the items we had.

Orion smirked at my shock expression.

I felt like a celebrity, like I was special. At this rate, I would never be able to fly economy again.

"You get used to it," Orion said as he led me up the stairs.

I knew he was trying to be encouraging, but I couldn't believe it. I didn't think I would ever get used to this type of lifestyle.

As he took a seat, I slipped into the cockpit to confirm our location with the pilot. “I’m sorry to be a bother.”

"You aren't, sir," he said with a nod. "I'll get you there, safe and sound."

"I appreciate you. I know this is a bit last minute.”

"It's not a problem at all. Tank is the king of last-minute plans. He pays us well enough that it’s not an issue."

I had no doubt about that. The comfort with which he navigated setting up this trip and didn't even balk when I said we needed a few days off work told me that he was used to pivoting. Once again, I marveled at how I had wound up in this world, how I had become part of these people's lives.

We settled in and got through all the pre-flight posturing before takeoff. It was only a couple of hours by plane, so there wasn't much time to really dig into what was going on.

I kept the conversation light, discussing upcoming plans for Sol and what we would do about his future long-term.

“Do you think he'll ever want to go back to school?” I asked Orion.

He lifted one shoulder. “It's possible. He might feel comfortable the older he gets. I would like to work with him on some self-defense moves. I want him to be able to fight off an attacker should anyone try to come after him. Or a bully if he runs across one of those two.”

“That sounds like a good idea.”

“And if he does decide to go back to school, it will have him equipped for whatever comes.”

We discussed more things like how he would handle his birthday party in three months, and what type of decorating I wanted to do to our home. He didn't believe me when I said that I liked it as it was, and I had learned to stop arguing early on.

If he wanted me to pick out fancy pillows and blankets, then I would do it just to make him feel like I cared.

I did.

I cared a lot, actually.

It was just hard to picture a future like that. I had spent so long in fight or flight mode, settling down was much harder than I thought it would be.

When we finally arrived at our destination, Orion's jaw dropped. "What are we doing here?"

I looked from him out to the air strip we landed on. There was a sign welcoming us to the town, and since there wasn't much to it to begin with, it made it fairly obvious where we were.

“I told you there's something I want you to see.”

He didn't say anything back. Instead, he followed me as we went downstairs to the car that was waiting there. Yet another one of Tank's gifts to us. How the man coordinated this and something in a town this small baffled me.

The driver took us straight to the storage unit. Orion, who was still very confused, didn't say a word. I led him to the largest unit they had and pulled out a key from my pocket. After I unlocked the door, I paused to face him.

“I just want you to know that I didn't mention this before because I wasn't quite sure how to bring it up. It's not an easy topic, and honestly, I hadn't given it much thought until you said something. But I want you to have it and whatever you want to do with it, we'll do it together. You're not alone, Orion.”

His eyes were watering. I think he knew what was behind this door. He understood just how pivotal this singular moment was.

His hands reached up to cradle my face before I could move. He pressed a hard kiss to my lips, then whispered, "Thank you."

When I rolled the door open, it was as if all the memories assaulted me at once.

The smell, though faint, was familiar. And some of the larger pieces of furniture were throwbacks to a life I had left behind ages ago.

One of Orion's hands covered his mouth as he rushed forward and ran his other over the back of a familiar flower-patterned couch.

It had been his mother's. The same one that we used to sit on together when she would clean my wounds. The same one that he learned how to clean my wounds from when she was working. We played video games on it and wrestled over food too.

It held more memories than it was worth, but to us, it was priceless.

He stepped around the couch towards a dresser. His mom's old dresser actually. The engravings on it had been done by some old man in the town. After he passed, it was given to Orion's mother.

That was one of the few ways the town had actually helped out. Any time something like that happened, they were one of the first families to receive donations.

My father, the prideful man that he was, refused to take anything from anyone. So we were left with whatever he could scrape together himself.

“Is it all here?” He asked in a rough whisper.

I nodded and pointed to the wall where boxes lined from floor to ceiling. There was a small path that you could weave through everything, but overall, it was stuffed to the brim.

“I made sure to put it all in here before I started my search for Sol. Some of it I had used in my own home, but a lot of it had just been sitting around in storage in my garage. I didn't want anything to happen to it, so I setup autopayments for this place and hit the road.”

Orion wiped away the tears that poured down his face. His eyes bounced around from item to item, never settling on one particular thing.

He went over to one of the shorter stacks of boxes and opened the lid.

A whine slipped from his lips as his hands reached inside. When he pulled them up, he held a bundle of oven mitts.

I chuckled at the sight. “I remember those.” I moved around the furniture to get to him.

We had learned how to crochet together and made these god-awful creations.

Orion sniffed. “Mom thought they were amazing, even though they barely did the job. I can't believe she kept them all.”

I reached out to cover his hands. “Baby, she kept everything. Your entire life is in these boxes from your childhood up until the minute you were taken. Even after, she has clippings of newspapers from big trafficking busts and articles about information on how to reach out to law enforcement. She researched and planned and hunted for you, not once giving up, not even at the end.”

He dropped the oven mitts back into the box, then wrapped himself around me. His sobs tore at my soul. I cried too, for the woman who didn't get to see the man he had become, for the boy who lost out on a chance for a normal childhood, for the man I loved who was hurting.

When he pulled back a few minutes later, I brushed away the last of his tears.

“What would you like to do with it all? We can take it back with us. We can go through it here. Though it might take a while.”

His grin was small, but there. “I would like to take it with us. I know it probably won't fit on the plane, but can we drive it or hire someone? What do you think I should do?”

He was flustered, I realized. The man who had kept his cool and planned things out was reverting to the young boy I knew who would fly by the seat of his pants any time a problem arose.

For him to defer to me for help felt like the greatest gift he could give me. I rubbed his back as I responded.

“Since Tank was so eager to help us get here, I'm sure he wouldn't mind us coordinating someone to load this all up carefully and bring it home.”

“You think?”

“Maybe we could take a day to stay here and look at some things ourselves before we head back.”

He smiled wider. “I think that's a brilliant plan.”

I kissed him then. It was a slow kiss filled with love and memories and a hope for the future.

I knew that no matter what, I had given him a part of his past that he thought was long lost. I had brought him closure on something he didn't think even existed. It was a relief.

“Thank you for this,” he said.

I didn't even realize how much I wanted it until it was in front of me.

“Which box should we go to next?” I suggested when we both got too quiet. I didn't know how to accept his thanks because to me, it was the right thing to do.

I didn't want gratitude. I just wanted him whole. I wanted him to be mine.

And he was.

Orion spun around, then went to another stack of boxes and pulled one down. "We'll start here," he said.

I nodded at him, then pulled out my phone. “You get to looking while I call Tank. We should probably get started on this right away.”

Orion ripped open the tape as I stepped back out into the storage unit and walked away.

I dialed Tank's cell, and he answered quickly. "Everything okay?"

I smiled at his worry.

"Everything's fine," I replied. “But since you were able to coordinate a private driver in a town this size, I was hoping you'd be able to help me with something else. We need to move an entire storage unit's worth of memories back home. Think you can help?”

Tank's laugh boomed across the line. “There isn't anything that I can't find a way to make happen. Give me a little bit. I'll be in touch.”