Chapter 28 Neon Snow
TWENTY-EIGHT
NEON SNOW
TROY
Iwas still sore as hell three days after getting out of the hospital, and Declan was making it his personal mission to ensure I didn't lift a finger for anything that might qualify as physical activity.
“I can get my own water,” I said from the couch where he'd basically installed me like a piece of furniture.
“I'm already up.” He brought me the glass anyway and set it on the table beside me. “You need anything else?”
“I need you to stop hovering like I'm made of glass.”
“You just got out of the hospital two days ago after nearly dying. I'll hover if I want to.”
“Two days is plenty of time to recover from nearly dying.”
“That's not how recovery works and you know it.” He sat down beside me and checked the pill bottles on the table like he'd been doing every three hours since we got home. “You're due for pain meds in twenty minutes.”
“I don't need them.”
“Your ribs are still cracked. You need them.”
“I've had worse.”
“That doesn't make me feel better about this situation.” He picked up the bottle anyway and set it where I could reach it. “Humor me.”
I looked at him and saw the exhaustion still living in the lines around his eyes, the way his shoulders hadn't fully relaxed since Rafael.
The man had barely slept. Had spent most of the past few days making sure I was breathing, eating, taking my meds on schedule like my continued existence depended on his vigilance.
Which it probably did, but I wasn't about to tell him that.
“Fine. I'll take the damn pills. But only because you asked so nicely.”
“I didn't ask nicely. I told you to take them.”
“Potato, potato.”
He smiled at that, small and tired but real. “You're a pain in the ass.”
“And yet you're still here.”
“Yeah, well. I've invested too much time keeping you alive to quit now.”
I grabbed his shirt and pulled him down for a kiss that lasted longer than it probably should have given that I was supposed to be resting. When we broke apart, his expression had softened into something that made my chest tight.
“You keep kissing me like that and I'm going to think you actually like having me around,” he said.
“Don't let it go to your head.”
“Too late.”
The doorbell rang before I could come up with a response. Declan got up to answer it and I heard Mara's voice before I saw her.
“If he's not dressed, I'm turning around and leaving.”
“He's dressed,” Declan called back.
“Shame. I brought food and opinions.”
She walked into the living room carrying enough bags to feed a small army. Her eyes landed on me and she gave me that assessing look that said she was cataloging every injury and deciding whether or not I was allowed to live.
“You look less dead than I expected,” she said finally.
“Thanks. I worked really hard on that.”
“I can tell. Very convincing.” She started unpacking food onto the coffee table with the efficiency of someone who'd done this a hundred times before. “Declan, your kitchen is a disaster. How do you live like this?”
“It's not that bad,” Declan said.
“You have three different kinds of protein powder and no actual food. That's the definition of bad.”
“I have food.”
“Coffee and whatever Troy brings you doesn't count.”
I snorted. “She's got you there.”
“I'm not taking criticism from someone who lived on energy drinks and spite for six years,” Declan shot back.
“That was a balanced diet and you know it.”
Mara unpacked containers of what looked like actual home-cooked food and gave Declan a look that could have stripped paint. “You're both disasters. I don't know how either of you survived this long without adult supervision.”
“We're very resilient,” I said.
“You're very lucky.” She sat down in the chair across from me and opened one of the containers. “Eat. You're too skinny.”
“I'm not too skinny.”
“You just spent a week getting tortured and hospitalized. You're too skinny.”
“That's not how body weight works.”
“Eat the food, Troy.”
I ate the food because arguing with Mara when she was in caretaking mode was a losing battle. Besides, it was good. Better than good.
The doorbell rang again. This time it was Luka and Ash, followed by Dmitri about five minutes later. The house filled up fast with bodies and voices and the kind of warm chaos that came from people who'd survived hell together and were still standing.
“You look terrible,” Dmitri said when he saw me. He dropped onto the couch beside me hard enough to make me wince. “But alive. This is good.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence.”
“I am honest man. You want me to lie, I can lie. But you look like shit.”
“He's supposed to look like shit,” Mara called from the kitchen where she'd taken over completely. “He nearly died.”
“Yes, this is what I said. He looks terrible but alive. Is compliment.”
Luka settled into one of the chairs with Ash beside him, both of them looking more relaxed than I'd seen them since this whole mess started. “How are you feeling?”
“Like I got waterboarded and then thrown down some stairs.”
“Accurate assessment.” Luka's mouth twitched. “Declan's been keeping you under house arrest?”
“He's been hovering like I'm going to spontaneously combust if he looks away.”
“You did almost die,” Declan said from where he was helping Mara in the kitchen. “Multiple times. I'm allowed to be cautious.”
“Cautious is one thing. This is bordering on paranoid.”
“Also allowed.”
Ash smiled at that. “He's got a point. You do have a talent for finding trouble.”
“I don't find it. It finds me.”
“That's not better,” Luka said.
“I'm aware.”
Dmitri grabbed one of the beers Declan had set out and cracked it open. “So when do you leave for London?”
The question hung in the air for a second, heavier than it should have been. I looked at Declan and saw him pause in the kitchen, waiting for my answer.
“Couple weeks probably. Need to get medical clearance first and make sure I'm not going to collapse on the plane.”
“Responsible,” Dmitri said. “Unlike you.”
“I'm very responsible.”
“You got kidnapped and tortured because you walked into obvious trap.”
“It wasn't obvious.”
“Was very obvious. Everyone saw it except you.”
Mara came back into the living room with plates and started distributing food like she was running a mess hall. “He's right. It was pretty obvious.”
“I thought we were friends,” I said.
“We are friends. That's why I'm allowed to tell you when you're being an idiot.”
“Harsh but fair,” Ash said.
Luka took the plate Mara handed him and studied me with that assessing look he did when he was deciding whether or not to say something. “You planning to come back?”
“To Chicago? Probably not for a while.”
“That's not what I asked.”
I knew what he was asking. Whether this was a temporary move or if I was burning bridges and starting over somewhere that didn't smell like blood and old ghosts.
“I don't know yet,” I said honestly. “London feels like the right move right now. After that, we'll see.”
“We,” Dmitri repeated. “You and Declan. You are doing this together.”
“That's the plan.”
“Good plan. Better than your last plans.”
“All of my plans are excellent.”
“All of your plans end with you bleeding.”
“Not all of them.”
“Name one.”
I opened my mouth and realized I couldn't actually name one. “Fuck.”
Declan came back into the living room and sat beside me on the arm of the couch, his hand settling on my shoulder in a way that felt automatic now. “His plans are getting better.”
“Low bar,” Mara said.
“Very low bar,” Luka agreed.
“I'm right here,” I said.
“We know.” Ash smiled. “That's why we're comfortable roasting you.”
The conversation flowed into easier territory after that.
Mara and Luka got into one of those verbal sparring matches they seemed to enjoy, trading barbs about strategy and risk assessment that was clearly rooted in mutual respect but sounded like they were about to kill each other.
Dmitri provided color commentary that made everything funnier.
Ash mediated when things got too heated and made sure everyone stayed fed.
And I just sat there watching it happen, feeling the strangeness of being in a room full of people who'd all nearly died for me in the past two weeks and were now arguing about whether Chicago deep dish counted as real pizza.
“It's not pizza,” Mara said flatly. “It's a casserole with delusions.”
“Is pizza,” Dmitri insisted. “Has cheese, has sauce, has bread. Is pizza.”
“By that logic, lasagna is pizza.”
“Lasagna is lasagna. Is different thing.”
“How?”
“Because lasagna has layers. Pizza is flat.”
“Deep dish has layers.”
“Deep dish has depth. Is different from layers.”
I looked at Declan and found him already looking at me with an expression that said he was thinking the same thing I was. That this was insane and perfect and exactly what we needed.
He leaned down and kissed me in front of everyone, quick and sure, and I heard Mara make a gagging sound that was at least fifty percent affection.
“Get a room,” she said.
“It's my house,” Declan pointed out.
“Then get a room in your own house. We don't need to see that.”
“You literally just watched,” I said.
“Against my will.”
“You could have looked away.”
“I was eating. You ambushed me.”
Luka laughed, actually laughed, and I realized I'd never heard him do that before. It changed his whole face, made him look younger and less like he carried the weight of an entire criminal network on his shoulders.
“I like her,” he said to me.
“She's tolerable,” I agreed.
“I'm sitting right here,” Mara said.
“We know,” Declan and I said at the same time.
The gathering went on for another few hours.
People ate and drank and talked shit and laughed too loud in that way that came from surviving and getting to be loud about it.
I watched Declan relax incrementally with every minute that passed, watched the tension bleed out of his shoulders until he looked like someone who might actually be able to sleep tonight.