Chapter Four #2
Yeah, that sounded like his grandson. He would ABSOLUTELY warn this man. That told him all he needed to know about him. Ethan wouldn’t have bothered had the man not been special to him.
The smoke was right.
“So, my son has been telling tales,” he stated, not calling him grandson for a reason.
He’d raised the boy.
And he’d made this mess.
Now, it was his to clean up. While Callen and Ethan called it meddling, he didn’t do it out of boredom.
He did it out of guilt.
Timothy had created this mess by not holding Wyler’s feet to the fire when he did stupid shit.
That was on him.
He’d let Catherine die alone, and Ethan be taken by CPS. Ethan still hated him for that. Only, those were things he couldn’t fix. One day, Ethan would have to come to grips with it and forgive him.
Or not.
This…
This he could fix.
Temporarily.
“He has,” Gene said, sipping the coffee. “Do you know where he is? I’ve come to bring him home.”
Timothy sat there, and he could feel this man’s energy. It was good, pure, and exactly what Ethan needed.
He could see the roughness in the man, but that would appeal to Ethan. It would be his opposite, and they all knew that was what made attraction happen.
“Good,” Timothy finally said. “Because being here is the last thing he needs. Ethan and the reservation are like oil and water. One wishes to cling to the other, but the other cannot hold it in place.”
It was a visual, but Gene understood it.
“He’s complicated,” Gene offered, defending the man he loved.
Timothy lifted a brow.
“Is that so?” he asked, knowing better than anyone about Ethan’s intricacies. After all, he’d created most of them with missteps and mistakes.
Gene wouldn’t explain, but he would defend him. Despite being angry with him, he loved Ethan very much.
“Yes, and I wouldn’t have him any other way. I’ve had the privilege of being your son’s partner for a while now. I love him more than he knows, clearly.”
Oh, boy.
Timothy heard that anger simmering below the surface, and it wasn’t a good thing.
Timothy tried to help.
“Him running from this situation hurt you.”
Gene laughed.
It was clear the woo-woo was strong with this one. Ethan hadn’t been exaggerating.
“Oh, you could say that.”
Timothy was curious.
“Does it make you not love him as much?”
He stopped drinking the coffee and said the one thing that came into his mind.
“No. It makes me love him more. He needs me now. He just doesn’t know how to ask for help. He’d rather carry the world on his shoulders than feel like a burden. He’ll never be a burden to me. I’d die for him, so while I’m not thrilled that he ran, I’m not giving up on him. Ever.”
And Timothy believed it.
There was no doubt that this man would be the first wave to start healing Ethan. He would unlock the ability for him to love not only himself, but others.
That mattered.
These lessons would set him up for what would come as a husband and father.
Yes, he needed this man in his life.
“You’re a wise man, Mr. Cantrell.”
Gene knew that Ethan had said nothing to his grandfather about him, so again, they were taking a walk on the woo-woo side.
Truthfully, it was creepy and weird at its finest, but he didn’t mind. One day, he would marry Ethan. One day, he’d make him his. Then, he’d have to face the pain in Ethan’s past.
This man.
But they’d do it as a unified front.
“Hardly,” Gene said. “I’m a man in love, and a man willing to fight for Ethan until my last breath. He’s mine,” he said, putting his casted arm over his chest. “No matter what happens, he’s mine.”
Again, Timothy believed him.
“Then, if you want him to survive this storm, get him away from here.”
Gene hadn’t been expecting that.
Not.
At.
All.
Ethan had told him how much his grandfather wanted both him and Callen to marry nice Native women and give him great-grandchildren.
This was…not that.
“Pardon?”
He was to the point.
“One day, he will return, and it will be because it is time. Until then, he has things he must accomplish. I’ve seen it in the smoke. Now is not the time for him to be here. While I want the rift between him and his brother fixed, timing is everything when it comes to the balance of the universe.”
Gene said nothing.
Instead, he let the older man speak.
Curiosity was killing that cat.
“I will say that if you don’t let the anger go, Mr. Cantrell, you and Ethan won’t last long. A wise man was out with his grandson in the woods, and there were two wolves. One was anger, and one was joy. The old man asked the grandson one question.”
Gene waited.
“Which will you feed?” he asked. “Because you can only feed one.”
And he got it.
Gene had to make a choice for their future, and that meant letting the past go.
“I’ll always feed the one who brings joy. I will always fill Ethan up because I know that if he is empty, the other wolf will be able to kill the weaker one. Joy can’t survive if anger is there.”
Timothy smiled.
Yes, he liked him.
The man was wise beyond his years, and that was the kind of man Ethan needed.
A protector.
“One day, Mr. Cantrell, you will be asked to pick your spirit animal. In our culture, we go into the smoke with the Shaman and find it. I can tell you that yours is the wolf. You bring joy to my grandson. When it is time to pick your spirit animal, choose the wolf.”
He could do that.
“Am I allowed to have a spirit animal? I don’t want to trivialize your culture or Ethan’s.”
He laughed.
“It is only trivializing it if you mock it—not if you use it to guide you. We all have something that leads us. The wolf is a protector, and he’s aware of all going on around him. That is you, Mr. Cantrell.”
Well, if he said so.
“Thank you, then, for the gift,” he said.
That sealed it for Timothy. It was mind-boggling that the White man got it, but he couldn’t get his Native grandsons to understand.
Seriously?
“You will find him at Callen’s cabin. He ran to his brother because he knew he’d hide him from me—if that was possible.”
It felt like a test, and Gene only hoped he’d passed. Ethan told him countless times that this man was the great manipulator and meddler.
Only, he felt like he wasn’t so much meddling, as protecting his sons.
Grandsons.
Whatever.
“You’ll marry him one day,” Timothy admitted. “You will marry him in front of your family and friends, and you will have children with him.”
Gene’s heart skipped.
“I will?” he asked.
Timothy nodded.
“It will feel like it won’t happen, but then one day, it will, and he will choose family over career.”
That was hard to believe. He knew that Ethan wanted to climb the ladder.
“So, he’ll marry me?”
Timothy nodded.
“Beneath that fear, the fear of being nothing, that seed has already been planted, Mr. Cantrell. Water it well, and it will come to fruition. Like with the wolves, love is like water, and anger is like the hot sun.”
Oh, he would water the shit out of that.
“Ethan hurts because it is all he knows. You fix that in him because you keep that wolf at bay. He’s seen too much, and he’s lived many lives. This is his final one. This is his last journey to learn life’s lessons. For him, this is the hardest one.”
Gene put the coffee cup down, and he couldn’t help himself.
“How do I fix this?” he asked. “I don’t want to lose him to this.”
Timothy was honest.
“You stop being angry, and instead, love him more. He didn’t leave you because he didn’t love you. He ran because he’s always run when he hurt. He found his mother dead in bed from succumbing to cancer. He ran to my cabin, a mile, in the snow, crying. That was when he raced from what chased him.”
That broke Gene’s heart.
A single tear slipped down his cheek, and he wiped it away. In that moment, that anger was gone.
“He ran from here because of betrayal.”
Oh, he was aware.
“Kaya Cheek.”
Timothy shook his head.
“No. Me. I let them take him, and even as a teenager, close to being a man, he watched me not fight for him. He expects to have to defend himself. Now, you have to start fixing him so one day, he can love fully.”
When the Raven came.
Oh, well, Gene would protect him.
“I’ll never leave his side.”
Timothy knew that wasn’t true. There would come a day when it became so heavy that Gene couldn’t hold the world up anymore, and he would walk away.
And instead of racing back to save Ethan, he would choose himself. Instead of chasing Gene, Ethan would feel lost again, and the Raven would come.
But until then, there were years of love waiting.
And Ethan needed them.
“Here is his location,” he said. “You will find him here,” Timothy offered, scribbling down directions to Callen’s cabin. “Get him out of here. Tomorrow. Please.”
Well, that was something he hoped to achieve. After all, they had to be back in Philly by Monday.
“I will.”
Timothy handed him the directions.
“Bring him here tonight. We will have dinner. Callen will want to say goodbye. Again.”
Gene tucked the paper into his pocket.
And shared.
“He loves Callen a lot.”
Timothy laughed.
Oh, the irony of that statement.
Trust and believe, he knew what would become of his grandsons’ relationship. He’d seen that in the smoke too. Had Callen been born of another father, he and Ethan would have been a couple.
The twin spirits would have come together. The only wall between them was the fact that they were half-siblings.
“Oh, well, Callen feels the same. Only, the worst part of being brothers is the fighting, but if one needed the other, they would show up.”
Gene believed that.
If his brothers called, he’d head home. Oh, they likely wouldn’t because of him being gay, and his parents disappointed in him, but still.
He’d go.
“I’ll try to get him here for dinner. Ethan isn’t easily convinced either way. I can’t force him into the vehicle at gunpoint.”
Timothy laughed.
“That was a polite way of saying he is stubborn. I am WELL-AWARE.”
Gene laughed too.
“But it’s sexy, so…”
Timothy stood.