25. Talon
Chapter twenty-five
Talon
N ight falls differently by the ocean. I’ve forgotten that.
The darkness doesn’t just descend; it rises, slow and heavy, from the water itself, swallowing the horizon before it creeps up to claim the sky.
I stir the pasta sauce, watching steam curl, keeping half an eye on Quell.
He leans against the porch railing, silhouette cut sharp against the last purple light, looking more relaxed than I’ve seen him in weeks.
My grandmother’s old wooden table creaks when I shift my weight, the sound so familiar it almost hurts.
Her rules still echo in my head: no one eats unless they help.
The pasta water bubbles, nearly ready, and the tomato sauce fills the salt air with basil and garlic. Simple food. Real food. Not takeout eaten in safe houses with the blinds drawn tight.
“You could come help, you know.” I tap the wooden spoon against the pot. “House rules.”
Quell turns. The ocean wind messes up his hair.
His glasses catch the light from the kitchen, hiding his eyes for a second.
He’s been quiet since we aired out the house, moving through the rooms like he’s scared to disturb the dust. But now, there’s something different in the way he stands. Looser. Almost playful.
“So, Daddy, you're making me help you with feeding your boy?”
The words just hang there. I freeze, spoon suspended above the sauce. Quell’s face flushes, obvious even in the dim light.
“I was joking,” he blurts out, his voice tight. “That was stupid. I didn’t mean…”
I set the spoon down and turn the burner to low. Two steps and I’m right in front of him. Close enough to smell the salt on his skin, see the pulse jump in his throat.
“You want to call me that, don’t you?” My voice goes lower than I mean. Rough around the edges.
Quell swallows, eyes darting away. He shrugs. Too casual. Too forced.
“I just thought…” He pushes his glasses up, a nervous habit, one I notice the first day. “It’s nothing. Forget it.”
“Quell.” I don’t touch him, but my voice makes him look at me. “You’re not scared of me anymore.”
Not a question. I’ve seen the change. The way he moves around me now, no more flinching. The way he reaches for me with without hesitation. The way he sleeps beside me, not curled up on the edge but sprawled out, trusting.
He breathes out slowly, almost lost in the rush of waves below the porch. “No,” he says finally. “I’m not scared of you.” His eyes lock on mine. Honest. Dark. It almost hurts to look back. “But I’m still terrified of what you make me feel.”
Something shifts in my chest, a loosening I can’t name. I lean back just a bit, enough to give him space. Behind us, the pasta water boils over, spitting and hissing where it hits the flame. I don’t move to fix it. I don’t want to break the moment. I don’t want to move at all.
“What does that mean?” I ask.
Quell’s fingers tap against the railing, restless, like he needs somewhere to put all that energy. “It means I’ve never wanted anyone the way I want you.” His voice snags on the words, like he’s afraid to say them. “It means I want things I don’t know how to ask for.”
I reach behind and turn off the stove. The silence comes down hard, making the ocean outside sound even louder, waves crashing in the dark. When I look back, Quell watches me, his face wide open, uncertain, waiting.
“I had a life before all this,” I say slowly and carefully.
“Before Vincenzo. Before I became what I am.” I hadn’t meant to tell him that.
Not tonight. Not ever. But the way he looks at me makes it impossible to hold back.
Like he actually wants to know. “I was with someone for almost three years. A man named Julian.”
Quell blinks. Surprise, then curiosity. “You never mentioned…”
“It ended badly,” I cut in. “The kind of bad where you leave town and change your number. The kind where you start over completely. Become a killer.”
The wind kicks up, rattling the wind chimes my grandmother hung on the porch. Glass disks that catch the light and scatter it everywhere. The sound is chaotic and annoying. My grandfather hated them, but he never took them down. Not even after Grandma died.
“What happened?” Quell asks, so quietly I almost miss it.
I look out at the black water. No horizon.
Just darkness. “Julian was gentle. Kind. A professor. Everything about him was careful and calm.” My hand grips the railing, knuckles white.
“I wasn’t. Not with him. I wanted… different things.
Control. His surrender.” My throat closes up.
“He didn’t understand. When I finally told him what I needed, he made me feel like I was asking for something ugly. ”
“You asked if he would call you Daddy?” Quell shifts, moving closer. He doesn’t say anything more, just watches me. He has that artist’s stare, the one that strips everything down to the bones.
“I said I wanted to be his Daddy, but he hated it, laughed at me.” That was the worst moment of my life, more than losing my parents.
I'd opened my mouth and ruined my entire life in one sentence.
I thought he'd say no, laugh it off, and then we'd never mention it again.
And I'd be happy because that part of me wouldn't have been a secret.
“I was ashamed,” I add with a jolt, realizing how silent I've become. “Packed up and left the next day. Didn’t say goodbye. Joined the military. Put everything that made me weak in a box and buried it.” I laugh, but it sounds bitter.
“And Alfie Thomas Harrington the Third became Talon. No past. No weakness. Just a weapon.”
Quell’s hand finds mine, fingers sliding in between. Just that touch, and I can breathe again.
“But the man you were, Alfie, that’s still you,” Quell says. “Isn’t it?”
I think about the years since. How careful I’ve been, cutting out every softness, every weakness. Building a fortress, brick by brick, until nothing could get in. Until I didn’t want anything I couldn’t have.
“I wanted things,” I say, careful to keep my tone even.
“Things I couldn’t ask for. Someone who’d need me enough to give in.
Someone who’d trust me with their safety, and pleasure.
” I squeeze his hand, not too tight. “Someone who’d let me be gentle and firm at the same time, and never mistake either for weakness. ”
Quell’s eyes are wide, dark, pupils huge in the dim. His breathing goes thin, shallow. “Like a Daddy,” he whispers, the word hanging there, no longer a joke.
I nod. Something in my chest loosens. “Yeah. Like that.”
He’s quiet for a while, thinking. The ocean keeps up its rhythm below, wave after wave, steady. I’ve forgotten how constant it is, how it turns silence into something you can rest in.
“I used to draw these pictures,” Quell says, voice soft.
“Not like the ones you’ve seen. Before the visions.
Just… sketches. Stuff I wanted. But after the visions…
” His voice catches. “Sometimes I’d draw hands holding me down.
A figure standing over me. No face. Just a presence.
” He looks at our hands, still joined. “I didn’t know what it meant.
I just wanted to feel small and safe at the same time. ”
I let go of his hand, just to touch his chin, tilting his face up. “And now?”
“Now I know what I want.” He’s steady, even as his cheeks flush. “You.”
I brush his cheek, feeling the heat. “I don’t want a boy who’s obedient,” I say, not even sure where the words come from. “I want a boy who’s honest.”
Quell’s breath hitches. “Then you’ve got one.” His eyes don’t leave mine. “I want both. The killer and the man. Talon and Alfie. All of it.”
Something in me breaks open at that. Not pain, just relief. All the walls I’ve built, the distance, gone under the weight of his honesty. I pull him in, arms around his waist, lifting him until he gasps.
“Come here,” I say, low, and sit back in one of the old Adirondack chairs on the porch. I settle Quell on my lap, his back to my chest, both of us facing the dark ocean. My arms stay tight around him, holding him against the night’s chill.
“I thought you were making dinner,” he chuckles as he relaxes into me.
“It'll keep,” I say, my chin resting on his shoulder. “This matters more.”
We sit there for a while, just like that.
His weight, warm and solid, pressed against me.
The night wraps us up. Quiet, cool, except for the waves.
I can feel his heartbeat through his back, steady against my chest. My hand finds his.
The pads of my fingers trace over the calluses on his fingertips, years of gripping pencils too tight.
“I’m not Alfie anymore,” I say, voice low. “I haven’t been for a long time. Maybe I never really was.”
Quell nods, his head moving against my shoulder. “And you’re not just Talon. Not anymore.”
“No,” I agree. “I’m not.”
“So who are you?” he asks, turning a little so he can see my face.
I look at him. This artist. This dreamer. This man, who’s seen through my eyes and still wants me close. Who held a gun to my head and couldn’t pull the trigger. Who followed me into exile, no questions asked.
“I’m yours,” I say. That’s it. “That’s enough for now.”
He smiles, soft and real, and leans back against my chest. My arms tighten around him, protective and possessive. Out past the porch, the ocean keeps moving, waves building and breaking in the dark. Invisible now, but still there. Still constant.
Same as whatever this is, growing between us. Careful, fragile, but real. Not just a thing with a name. Not just a dynamic. But something deeper. An understanding. A kind of promise.
I press my lips to his temple. He shivers.
“Cold?” I ask.
“No,” he whispers. “Just happy.”
The pasta’s probably ruined. The sauce is definitely burned. But it doesn’t matter. We have time. Tomorrow, and the day after that. Time to cook and eat and talk. Time to figure out what we are, now that we’re not running.
For tonight, this is enough. Quell in my arms. The ocean, somewhere out there in the dark. And honesty, for once, where nothing has to hide.