Chapter 4 Ghosts Don’t Stay Buried #2
“I don't know what I'm doing here,” I admitted. “Don't know what I thought would happen. That coming home would fix anything? Make shit make sense? I'm still angry, Mom. Still so fucking angry that you died and he didn't. That I had to grow up without you. That he got to stay and you didn't.”
My throat was getting tight. I swallowed hard and tried to push past it.
“Rafael said he probably missed me. Said people don't raise kids who aren't theirs unless they care.” I laughed, bitter and choked. “But I don't know how to be around him without feeling like I'm betraying you.”
The tears came before I could stop them. Hot and fast, burning tracks down my face that I scrubbed away with the back of my hand.
“I miss you,” I said, and my voice broke. “Miss you so much it still feels like someone carved out part of my chest and never put it back. And I hate that I'm still crying at your grave like some kid who can't move on.”
I stood there for another minute, letting the grief wash through me, hating every second of it.
Hating that she was gone. Hating that Declan had stayed.
Hating myself for not knowing how to fix any of it.
Hating that I'd come back here at all, walked right back into the damage I'd spent six years trying to escape.
Finally I wiped my face one more time, shoved my hands back in my pockets, and turned away.
“I'll try to visit more,” I said over my shoulder. “No promises. But I'll try.”
The house was dark when I got there.
I let myself in, kicked off my boots, and grabbed a beer from the fridge.
The front door opened an hour later. I heard Declan's boots on the hardwood, heard him pause when he saw the lights on in the kitchen.
He appeared in the doorway a second later, and my brain short-circuited at the sight of him shirtless and gleaming with sweat.
Sweat caught the overhead light and made every line of muscle stand out in sharp relief.
His chest was broader than I remembered, defined in a way that said hours in the gym doing more than just casual workouts.
Tattoos covered both arms and spread across his shoulders, ink I'd only seen hints of before now on full display.
His abs were cut deep enough to cast shadows, leading down to a V that disappeared into low-slung gym shorts that hung off his hips like they were barely holding on.
He had a gym bag slung over one shoulder and a bag of takeout in his other hand, looking like he'd just walked off a photo shoot for some fitness magazine except he was sweaty and real and standing in my kitchen looking at me with those dark, unreadable eyes.
My mouth went dry. My cock stirred in my jeans, interested in a way that made me want to punch myself in the face.
No, absolutely fucking not. This was Declan. The man I was supposed to resent, not want to lick sweat off of.
My traitorous dick didn't give a shit about any of that.
“Didn't know you were home,” he said, setting the takeout on the counter. His voice was rough, probably from training, and it did absolutely nothing to help my situation.
“Got back a while ago.” I took a long drink of beer, keeping my eyes firmly on his face and not on the way his muscles shifted when he moved. Failed immediately. Looked anyway. Hated myself for it.
“You could've texted.”
“Didn't realize I needed permission to come and go.” My voice came out sharper than I meant it to, overcompensating for the fact that I was half-hard just looking at him.
His jaw tightened. “That's not what I meant.”
“Then what did you mean?”
“I meant it would've been nice to know you were here instead of coming home to an empty house and wondering if you'd disappeared again.” He grabbed a towel from the back of a chair and wiped sweat off his face and neck.
I watched the movement, mesmerized by the flex of his forearms, the way the towel dragged across skin I had no business noticing.
I was so fucked.
“I went out,” I said, forcing my brain to focus on words instead of the line of his collarbone. “Had drinks with a friend. Went for a walk. Came back. Didn't realize I needed to file a goddamn itinerary.”
“You don't. But a text would've been courteous.”
“Courteous.” I laughed. “Since when do we do courteous?”
“Since you're staying in my house and I'd like to know you're not dead in a ditch somewhere.” He tossed the towel aside and leaned against the counter. The position made his abs tighten, made every muscle in his torso stand out in sharp definition.
I looked away. Stared at my beer bottle like it held the secrets of the universe.
“Your house. Right. Good to know where I stand.”
Declan set his bag down harder than necessary. “That's not what I said.”
“Sounded like it to me.”
“Troy—”
“What?” I looked up at him and let irritation fuel my words because anger was safer than whatever the fuck else I was feeling. “You want me to act like I live here? Want me to check in like a teenager with a curfew? Want me to pretend that we're just one big happy family?”
“I want you to act like an adult who gives a shit.”
“Nobody asked you to worry.”
“Yeah, well. I do it anyway.” He pushed off the counter and took a step closer. “Comes with the territory of raising you.”
“You didn't raise me,” I said. “You babysat me until I was old enough to leave.”
Declan went very still. The air in the kitchen went heavy with the weight of that statement landing exactly how I'd meant it to.
“Right,” he said finally, and his voice had gone quiet in a way that felt worse than anger. “My mistake.”
We stared at each other across the kitchen. Then his expression changed. Softened. His eyes tracked over my face, lingering on details I couldn't see but could feel him cataloging.
“You've been crying,” he said quietly.
“No I haven't.”
“Troy.”
“I said I haven't.”
He didn't argue. Just grabbed two beers from the fridge and twisted the caps off with hands that were scarred across the knuckles in ways I didn't remember. He walked past me, close enough that I caught the scent of sweat and clean skin underneath, male and uniquely him.
My cock gave another interested pulse. I told it to shut the fuck up.
He headed into the living room. I heard the TV turn on. Heard him drop onto the couch with a sigh that sounded bone-deep.
I sat there for another minute, debating whether to go upstairs and lock myself in the guest room and maybe jack off to get this out of my system. Or do equally mature and healthy things like bang my head against the wall until I stopped noticing how hot my stepfather had gotten.
Instead I grabbed my beer and followed him into the living room.
Declan was sprawled on the couch, one arm stretched along the back, legs spread wide and taking up space like he owned it. Which he did.
Some sports recap show was on that neither of us cared about. He glanced at me when I walked in but didn't say anything. Just took a drink of his beer and went back to pretending the screen held his attention.
I sat in the chair across from him. Far enough away that we weren't sharing space, close enough that leaving would've been obvious.
Close enough that I could still see too much.
The way his chest rose and fell with each breath.
The shine of sweat still drying on his skin.
The tattoos I wanted to trace with my fingers.
Stop. Just fucking stop.
“You gonna put a shirt on?” I asked. It came out more aggressive than I meant it to. “Or are you trying to air-dry?”
He looked over at me, one eyebrow raised. “It's my house. I can sit here however I want.”
“Yeah, well. It's distracting.”
“Distracting how?”
“Just distracting.” I took a long drink of beer and tried to sound annoyed instead of affected. “Nobody needs to see that much of you.”
The corner of his mouth twitched. Not quite a smile but close. “You could always not look.”
“Hard not to when you're taking up half the room.”
“I'm sitting on one couch. You're the one who chose to sit directly across from me.” He shifted, stretched slightly, and I watched muscles move under skin like it was choreographed just to fuck with me. “But if it bothers you that much, I can grab a shirt.”
“I don't care what you do.”
“Clearly.” He took another drink, eyes never leaving my face. Reading me in that way he always had, seeing too much. “You're the one who brought it up.”
“Because it's weird.”
“What's weird about it? I just got back from the gym. I'm hot. Shirt was soaked through anyway.” He gestured at himself like this was perfectly reasonable. Which it was. Completely reasonable and normal and not at all designed to make me lose my mind.
“Fine. Whatever. Sit there half-naked. See if I care.”
“I will. Thanks for the permission.” There was amusement in his voice now, the bastard. Like he knew exactly what he was doing to me and was enjoying it.
I glared at him. He looked back, expression innocent except for the slight curve of his mouth that said he was absolutely fucking with me.
Then he stood up, and I watched him move across the living room toward the kitchen. Watched the muscles in his back shift, watched the way his shorts hung low enough that I could see the top edge of black boxer briefs underneath.
I adjusted myself in my jeans as subtly as possible, grateful he had his back to me.
He returned a minute later with two more beers, handed me one, and sat back down. Still shirtless. Still distracting as hell.
“Thanks,” I said finally. My voice was rough from crying and beer and the effort of not falling apart or getting any harder than I already was.
“Yeah.”
We sat there in the dim light of the TV, not talking, not fighting, just existing in the same space while my brain tried to reconcile the grief still sitting heavy in my chest with the inconvenient fact that I wanted to climb across the space between us and see if Declan tasted as good as he looked.
The silence didn't feel like a weapon anymore.
It felt dangerous in an entirely different way.
Outside, snow kept falling. Chicago kept existing. And somewhere in this city, Rafael knew I was here, knew where I was staying, knew more about me than I'd realized I'd told him.
I'd walked right back into old damage and new danger at once.
And I was too tired and too vulnerable and too fucking hard to care.