Chapter 24
Leo
“You saw what now?” I ask Mateo when he sits at the table beside me.
He chuckles. “You heard me. I had the perfect view until that asshole blocked me.”
“Good,” I say, punching his arm. “That’s my girl you were watching. You’re lucky he didn’t shoot you; he’s trigger happy.”
I’ve never seen someone move as fast as I did when that guy grabbed Alessa today. Before anyone even registered what happened, Zane was up and out of his chair.
“Whatever,” Mateo snorts.
I look down to the end of the pool where Zane has Alessa wrapped in his arms, her head thrown back in laughter.
I can’t believe the difference between them in such a few short days.
After the phone call from Jay, I thought for sure it was going to set her healing back.
Instead, it seemed to make her more determined to take him down.
“I have to take a piss,” Mateo announces, standing up.
“You know where it is,” I say, waving my hand. “Unless you need me to hold your fucking hand.”
Mateo chuckles while walking away.
Having both of them back felt damn nice. I worried about Evander while he was over there. When Gage and I visited, he didn’t seem like himself. I was just as curious as everyone else about what went down with him and Micah; it was something huge, and that’s all I knew.
Mateo comes jogging back out of the house, grabs my arm to jerk me out of my chair, pulling me into the house.
“What the hell?” I ask, just for him to clamp a hand over my mouth.
“Shut up,” he hisses, pulling me into the kitchen.
He pulls me just outside the doorway, and that’s when I hear Evander.
“That’s because you’re a fucking coward,” Evander says. What the hell?
“I’m not the one who ran away.”
I whip my head to Mateo. “Micah?” I mouth, and Mateo nods his head wildly.
“I didn’t run away,” Evander hisses. As one, Mateo and I peek around the corner. Evander and Micah are in a standoff in the middle of the kitchen, almost nose to nose.
“What are you…?” I don’t even give Alessa time to finish that sentence before I jerk her to me.
“Just listen,” I whisper in her ear.
She raises an eyebrow but nods her head.
“What the fuck do you call disappearing to Cabo?” Micah growls. Alessa looks at me slowly, her eyes comically wide.
“What did you expect?!” Evander almost yells. “You pulled me into your bullshit web of fucking lies and then told me you aren’t ready for anything serious.”
We all exchange an oh shit look before peeking around the corner again. Micah and Evander have moved apart on separate ends of the island. I want to feel bad for eavesdropping, but I am getting more confused by the second. I need answers. Did Micah hurt Evander?
“I said I wasn’t ready for anything serious yet, and I never lied to you, Van,” Micah says softly, much different from his previous tone.
“Yes, you did,” Evander says, then chuckles without humor. “It was my damn fault for falling for it, though.”
“Les wasn’t ready to find out about us then,” Micah says. I see Alessa’s brows furrow. “You left before I had a chance to fix it.”
“It’s too late now,” Evander replies.
“Why?” Micah demands. We can hear him moving again. “I fucked up. Let me fix it.”
“No,” Evander says sternly. “I told you the night I decided to leave, that was your only chance. You shut me out.”
“Everything with Les was going on…”
“Stop blaming everything on Les!” Evander yells, causing us to wince. “Take credit for your own shit, Micah.”
The stool from the island scrapes against the floor, and we haul ass into the living room, still listening.
“I’m trying to now,” Micah says, voice too close for comfort.
We slide just to the side of the living room doorway, out of sight, and I can feel Alessa’s shoulders shaking with silent laughter.
I feel like a kid listening to their parents argue.
Evander and Micah are just around the corner from us.
One wrong move and they would know we are here.
“I’m not falling for your shit again,” Evander answers. “I told you how I felt.”
“I didn’t know what to do! I’ve never had feelings for a guy before,” Micah argues.
“Neither have I,” Evander grinds out. “I should have never come back.”
“Then why did you?”
“Sure as fuck not for you,” Evander sneers, surprising Mateo and me.
Evander is the most level-headed person I knew; whatever he feels for Micah is tearing him up to act like that.
“Les convinced me to come back.” I peek at her face, and she smiles, letting me know he is telling the truth.
“I also came back for my brothers. The world doesn’t revolve around you. ”
It’s quiet for so long we think they walked away; when we start to step out, we hear a grunt and something hitting the wall by our heads. Concerned for Evander, I step around the corner when a groan hits my ears. A very sexual groan. Then the telltale sign of kissing.
“Oh my god,” Alessa whispers, hearing the same thing.
I feel Mateo’s shoulders shaking, so I look at him. His face is blood red, tears streaming down his face from trying not to laugh out loud. I am struggling from the thought of us being stuck here listening to my brother and Alessa’s uncle kissing on the other side of the wall.
“Goddamn it, Micah,” Evander says finally. “I can’t do this with you again.” Ten seconds later, we hear the front door slam.
“Fuck!” Micah yells. We wait, listening, then we hear another door slam further into the house.
“What the hell was that?” Alessa asks once she knows we’re in the clear. “Did you know about this?” she asks Mateo.
“Nope. I knew something was up, but he wouldn’t talk to me about it.”
“Micah hurt Evander?” she asks sadly.
I tuck her into my side. “Looks that way, baby.”
“Micah and Evander, though?” Mateo asks, “I had a feeling they were messing around, but I had no damn idea feelings were involved.”
I grab Alessa’s hand to lead her back outside when I see the huge t-shirt covering her up. She shrugs when she sees me looking. “Ryder covered me up as soon as I stepped out of the pool.”
“Good,” I reply with a chuckle. “Mateo told me about your little interlude with Holden while you were in there.”
She looks back at Mateo with narrowed eyes. “Big mouth.”
“You were just getting to the good part when your cop boyfriend blocked my view.”
“One, he’s not a cop anymore. Two, you’re lucky he didn’t shoot you,” Alessa replies, opening the door to take us to the back patio.
“That’s what I told him,” I say with a laugh.
“You were the one getting finger banged in the pool in front of everyone,” Mateo argues with a grin.
Alessa’s mouth pops open. “I’ve never heard such vulgar language in my life. You should be ashamed of yourself.”
“Who should be ashamed of themselves?” Gage asks, walking up and wrapping his arms around Alessa from behind.
“Mateo. He has a potty mouth,” Alessa tells him.
How the hell she’s keeping a straight face, I’ll never know.
Her mouth is worse than ours on a good day.
She spins around to face Gage. “I have details.” She leads us to a corner table and then fills Gage in on what we heard inside.
His eyes get wider by the second, making me bust out laughing.
“I knew it!” Gage yells, causing all of us to shush him at the same time. “I knew it,” he whispers.
Ryder walks over, plucks Alessa out of the chair, then sits with her in his lap. “I don’t trust you three together,” he comments.
“Sure, Ryder. You can sit here,” Alessa mutters, looking over her shoulder at him. He grins, pecking her on the lips.
“What are you gossiping about now?” Ryder asks, pulling her to lean on his chest.
“Nothing,” Gage and Alessa say at the same time, making mine and Ryder’s eyes roll.
As funny as our eavesdropping was, I am worried about Evander.
I knew something was wrong, but he would never tell me what it was; now I know why.
He didn’t want to put me in a situation to dislike Micah, knowing it would put a strain on Alessa and me.
I got it, though. Falling for a guy, when you never have before, is different.
It brought up many different emotions, some you didn’t know how to deal with, especially when you thought you were straight, like Evander and Micah.
I refuse to let this sway how I feel about Micah; I’m going to help.
I woke up the next morning, ate breakfast with everyone, then asked Micah if I could talk to him.
Alone. He looked skeptical, but agreed. Micah and I got closer after Les went missing; he stopped giving that look that he thought I was always up to something and finally accepted me into the family.
It didn’t mean we were best friends, though.
“What’s up?” he asks once we’re seated on the back patio.
Now that I am out here, I have no idea how to bring it up, so I figure the truth is the best. “I overheard you and Evander talking last night.”
Micah’s back goes ramrod straight. “What did you hear?”
“Enough to know some heavy shit went down for Evander to leave.”
“It was nothing,” Micah says, waving his hand like what I’m saying is ridiculous.
“Look,” I sigh, “Evander’s my brother, and it fucking sucks that he’s hurting, but I get it, Micah.”
“There’s nothing to get,” Micah says harshly. “It was nothing.”
“If it was nothing, why were you trying so hard to fix it?” I ask, just as harshly.
“Listen,” Micah growls.
“No. You listen,” I say, turning to face him.
This was more than just two people coming together in a moment of passion.
This was two people fighting their attraction to each other because they still thought it was wrong.
“I went through the same thing you’re feeling right now about Gage.
I thought I was losing my fucking mind whenever I thought about what it would feel like to be with him.
And when I started having feelings for him?
It was scarier than falling in love with Alessa.
” Micah finally turns his eyes to mine, signaling he is listening for once instead of getting defensive.
“There is nothing wrong if you do have feelings for Van. Your boss,” I jerk my thumb over my shoulder, indicating Alessa, “is very accepting of this sort of thing.”
Micah stares at me for so long I start to get nervous; he finally sits up, bracing his elbows on his knees and burying his head in his hands.
“I fucked up. It started as an experiment because we both felt…things.” He doesn’t have to explain what those things are.
“Then it wasn’t an experiment anymore, and I fucked it all up because I couldn’t admit I would ever have feelings for a man. ”
“What happened?” I ask gently. I need to know if I’m going to help either one of them.
Micah barks a harsh laugh, sitting back in his chair, leaning his head back to stare at the sky.
“He told me when he started feeling more and said that if I wasn’t feeling it, we needed to cool it with each other.
I couldn’t stay away from him,” Micah says hoarsely.
“I let him believe we were headed somewhere just because I’m a selfish fucking bastard, then he laid the ultimatum down that we tell you guys or he was out.
” Micah turns his head to look at me. “That’s when I told him I wasn’t ready yet and used Les as an excuse.
I fucking knew she would be fine with it, and so did he. "
“When did all this start?”
Micah looks back at the sky. “Almost as soon as the alliance was made. Les had me helping with getting them more social, preparing them for the return of the Perez’s.
It became more when we shared the pool house,” he sighs.
“The night he told me he was leaving to Cabo, I was an asshole. Instead of admitting what I felt and how much I didn’t want him to leave, I told him that what we had was just an experiment. That I never felt anything for him.”
“Holy shit, Micah.” No wonder Evander is fucked up over this. He is going through the same thing as Micah, trying to accept his feelings, and he got them shoved in his face. “Do you want to fix it? Or are you just leading him on again? Because I have to tell you, I won’t fucking like that.”
“I want to fix it, but it doesn’t matter now.” Micah smiles, but it’s sad. “After last night, he’s done.”
I roll my eyes before I can stop myself.
“One conversation isn’t going to fix what you did.
You need to remember he’s just as confused as you.
I know how that feels. Gage knows. Ryder knows.
Holden knows.” I stand up to head into the house to give him time to process what I just told him.
“You don’t have to deal with this alone. ”
He accepts that with a nod, so I make my way into the house.
Alessa is standing just inside the open patio door, tears streaming down her face.
She wraps her arms around my neck. “Thank you,” she whispers.
“I didn’t mean to creep your conversation.
I was coming to check on you guys because I thought you would be mad at Micah. I heard what you just told him.”
I pull her back, wiping the tears from her cheeks with my thumbs. “I wanted to be pissed at him, but I get it.”
“Have you heard from Evander?” she asks, tucking herself into my side and walking further into the house.
“Yeah. I asked if we could talk, and he said he would come over later.”
Alessa nods. “I’ll make sure Micah isn’t here. Your brother needs you, too.”
I’m sure as hell not an expert on this, but I am going to do everything in my power to help fix this so they can have what Gage and I have.