Chapter 26
Aberlour hadn’t bothered to visit Oliver.
Or at least, that’s the way he hoped it came across.
The truth was that he’d tried several times, but every time his hand had hovered over the door handle of Oliver’s room, he’d heard Abigail’s shrill voice and given up.
He couldn’t face him, not when she had her claws so firmly planted in him.
It would end one of two ways—with her death or with Abe’s.
So, he kept himself busy. He headed off base to check out the surrounding area for hours at a time.
He didn’t speak the language, didn’t bother with a map, he just—walked, until he found a place that served beer, and then he lost himself to the night.
He’d even managed to get laid once or twice.
If Abe had shut his eyes and pretended that she had dirty blond hair and a secretive, sexy smile, no one had to know.
Oliver was alive, and he’d get better. For now, Aberlour was off duty and Oliver was no longer his responsibility.
Team Specter was at a standstill. Most of his men gave Aberlour a wider berth than usual.
There were some unenthusiastic nods and smiles here and there whenever their eyes met.
He avoided them as much as possible, spending as much time away from their rooms as he could.
Training, fucking, and lots of drinking were his preferred methods of escape.
It was a coward’s way out, of course, but it was better than nothing.
He’d taken a page out of Oliver’s playbook.
It couldn’t last though.
Ghost, surprisingly enough, was the one who brought things to a head about two weeks after Oliver’s hospitalization.
Aberlour walked into the common area outside the bedrooms shared by Team Specter, and found his men sprawled on the sofa and chairs playing video games, as usual.
The mood in the room was lighthearted, but it darkened as soon as Aberlour arrived.
He didn’t bother acknowledging the change as he simply made a beeline for his bedroom.
He was only there to change, then he’d be out the door, and they’d be free of him again.
He was three steps away from his bedroom when the video game was put on pause, the sudden absence of gunfire and explosions making him stop and turn around.
“They’re releasing him tomorrow,” Ghost said in a normal tone of voice. Hearing him speak like that was startling.
“Good,” Aberlour replied, keeping his tone neutral.
“Good?” Ghost repeated. “That’s all you have to say?”
Aberlour’s hands fisted at his sides. He wanted to push the door open and shut it behind him, effectively ending the discussion before it could begin, but he knew it wouldn’t work.
If Ghost had decided to open this can of worms, nothing would close it until he got what he wanted.
They’d follow him into his bedroom without any qualms. Aberlour didn’t doubt that in the least.
He sighed and shrugged as he stared at Ghost.
“The doc was confident he’d make a full recovery. Now they’re releasing him. It’s good news,” Aberlour responded politely in an attempt to pacify Ghost and the others.
Ghost wasn’t buying it. He sat on the couch, his expression filled with disbelief and—was it anger, or annoyance in his eyes? Aberlour couldn’t be sure.
“Sit.”
Aberlour raised an eyebrow, surprised to be ordered around by the least confrontational guy on his team. Aberlour scoffed and shook his head, turning towards the door of his bedroom.
“Sit!”
Aberlour took a deep breath, refusing to listen, he lifted a hand, ready to ignore the command and leave them all—
“If you ever gave a single fuck about this team, you’ll sit down and listen.”
A bullet through the jaw would have been less painful than the insinuation that Aberlour didn’t care about his men. He spun around to face the room, jaw clamped tight, eyes dancing with fury as he stomped over to where Team Specter was assembled.
Marcus looked uncomfortable, staring at his hands in his lap, deliberately avoiding Aberlour’s gaze.
JD sat next to Ghost, arms crossed, right hand still clutching the video game remote.
His expression was similar to that of Ghost’s, demonstrating the strong possibility that they’d been working on a plan together.
The two were so distinctly different that knowing they’d been in cahoots should have been funny—except Aberlour had lost his sense of humour.
Carlos sat between JD and Marcus, looking enraged as his small black eyes scrutinized Aberlour.
He wanted blood—and Aberlour thought he might just get it.
“Sit,” Ghost said again, lowering his tone this time, gesturing to the coffee table in front of the couch. Rolling his eyes, Aberlour settled himself down on it, his legs too long for the low table, so he extended them and leaned back on his hands.
No one said anything at first. They just stared at him. Aberlour hitched an eyebrow in defiance and stared right back.
“Everything’s fucked,” JD said, breaking the silence and surprising all of them.
“Oli will be fine—”
“I’m not talking about Oli!” JD shouted angrily, interrupting Aberlour. “This team is fucked. Ya’ll fucked it up,” he accused blatantly. “I don’t know what the mess between you and Oliver is, and frankly—Dumber—I don’t care, but I’m sick and tired of pretending that I don’t see you hurting.”
It wasn’t exactly what Aberlour had thought JD—or any of them—would say. He began shaking his head in denial.
“We might be dumbasses—but we’re not blind,” Ghost said earnestly and carefully.
It was ridiculous.
“There’s nothing to say,” Aberlour replied.
“Abe—they could write encyclopedias with all the things you don’t say—that doesn’t mean you’re okay,” Marcus said, matching Ghost’s concerned tone.
“Oli will be back with us tomorrow. Things will get back to the way they were,” he stated with a dismissive shrug.
“Things haven’t been fine!” JD argued. “Oli fucked you over—and you’re pretending to be fine because—” he hesitated, looking sideways at Marcus for help with finishing the statement.
“It’s like you’ve decided we’d take his side, and you just—abandoned ship. Decided to cut your losses and left us to deal with him.” Marcus looked at him as if he couldn’t believe how stupid Abe had been acting.
Aberlour cleared his throat. What could he say? What was there to say?
“I’m—”
“I swear on my abuella’s head that if you say you’re fine I’ll bite your fucking nose off and shove it up your ass,” Carlos vowed heatedly before Abe could finish.
Abe’s mouth closed. The sparkplug of their team frequently got worked up, but it was rare to see him so angry. Certainly not directed at one of his own. The first time had been when Oli had been in surgery. Aberlour had chalked it up to frayed nerves but now—
“You want to go off, get laid and get drunk, fine, but you take us along. You need to let us pound Jack Daniels back with you. You don’t do that alone!” JD sounded genuinely hurt.
Aberlour had thought he knew what was wrong with Team Specter. He’d thought—well, that they resented him for weakening the bond between him and Oliver, but that wasn’t the problem at all.
“You don’t push us away, you fucking asshole. Never!” Carlos insisted, looking like he was two seconds away from following up on that threat of biting Aberlour.
“I think what the kids are trying to say—” Marcus began, momentarily interrupted by JD’s instinctive protest, and Ghost’s light smack to the back of his head.
“Is that we’re a team. All of us in equal measure.
You fight, you drift apart, it’s all fine.
No one said you had to be glued to Oli’s side for us to follow you—”
It was fucking astounding. The understanding, the pain, the bond.
All of it, like a string that pulled from Aberlour’s chest to theirs, in perfect accord.
He stared at each of them for a long minute, and none of them uttered a single word, a truly exceptional feat for such yappers.
Then Aberlour cracked a smile and gave a gentle nod of understanding.
He didn’t speak. Wasn’t sure he could without tears welling up and breaking into sobs.
“Move over. Carlos is due an ass whooping,” Aberlour finally managed, after a long, tense minute.
The reaction was exactly as it should be. Carlos bitching in quick Spanish, Marcus laughing like he might hack up a lung, JD calling for blood, and Ghost smiling with satisfaction.
Aberlour wasn’t a threat at video games, but he gave it his best shot. They played all evening, and when they all got tired of getting schooled by Ghost, they went out for a beer and shot some pool.
It felt like spring. Nothing was green, or clean, or quite as it should be, but it was mending and thawing something that had once been beautiful.
Slowly but surely, fixing the hollowed-out parts of him.
Aberlour had lost Oli. He had. But he had more than just Oli.
He had a world in these men, and while their military careers might be coming to a close, what they had would remain intact as long as he let them in.
As they stumbled back to base together, five drunk Americans, living up to the stereotype by being as loud and belligerent as possible, Aberlour allowed these wonderful moments with his men to sink into his bones.
“It’s good to have you back, Abe,” Marcus whispered to him, before they parted ways for the night. If Aberlour held him tighter and longer than usual, no one said anything about it.
It felt like spring—but like all springs, there was yet another rainstorm just around the corner, waiting to be weathered.
He should have known it wouldn’t last.