Chapter Twenty-Nine
Micah
I spent so much time emotionally preparing for the whole Western showdown situation, I forgot to plan for the aftermath. I wasn’t totally convinced there would be an aftermath, to be honest. A significant, rational portion of my consciousness was convinced none of us would be walking away from tonight alive, let alone successful.
Whatever I did to have the gay gods bless this union, thank you . Because that was all a shot in the fucking dark.
I still have no idea if Patrick knew we were bluffing about going to the FBI. I know I sold it, and I’m a good liar when I have to be. Tadhg, bless his soul, is a terrible liar. It’s one of the reasons I was always planning to crash the party. That and the fact that something like what did happened was probably inevitable.
Maybe he thought we were bluffing but didn’t want to risk it. Maybe he believed me. Maybe he just decided all this drama wasn’t worth it, and he wanted to free himself of the son who had become such a burden to him as soon as it was obvious Tadhg would never be what Patrick wanted.
The real gamble was that Patrick had enough humanity in him to let Tadhg leave alive. I was always leaning toward yes, because as much as that man has terrorized our lives, he’s not a Disney villain. We both know he raised us how he was raised. I was always a write-off for him, my queerness evident from the start, but I’m sure he thought he could ‘fix’ Tadhg’s shortcomings if he just pushed him hard enough.
Unfortunately, my babygirl doesn’t respond well to beatings. So buh-bye, Patrick. Whether you bought the FBI story or not, we’re finally free. No more you, no more Eamon, no more Banna bullshit.
If only Tadhg seemed willing to accept this.
As soon as he hit the ground outside Ford’s shop, I knew he wasn’t taking this well. He’s been nearly catatonic ever since. It took Ford and Tristan helping to get him into the car, and by the time we got back to the apartment he was focused enough to walk upstairs for me, but unresponsive for anything else.
He’s sitting on the couch now, staring into space. I wrap a blanket around his shoulders even though it isn’t cold in here, because I don’t really know what else to do. I want to get him out of those stupid tactical clothes, but it would be too much of a fight. I don’t expect him to be magically okay.
Sure, he got what he wanted, but he also got abandoned by someone he’s spent his whole life fighting for approval from. That’s tough. I get it.
But he’s scaring me.
I kneel in front of him, positioned between his legs with one hand resting on each knee. My hands rub up and down his thighs over and over, gradually drawing his attention to me.
“Can you say something for me, doll? Anything. How you feel, what you want, what you’re worried about?”
Tadhg frowns. “I don’t… I don’t know.”
“Okay,” I say, nodding. “That’s okay. That’s something to start with. Are you hungry?”
He shakes his head.
“Do you want to shower? Or sleep for a while?”
Another shake.
I study his face. He doesn’t look distressed, exactly. But he didn’t have to tell me he was confused for me to know; it’s written in his features. His eyes dart from side to side under a furrowed brow. His hair is messy from the tussle with Patrick, and it’s grown long enough that it’s falling in his eyes a little.
The bruising on his neck is pretty bad and looks even worse in the light of my apartment. I really want to take him to the hospital for an actual evaluation, because strangulation can cause all sorts of terrible shit that isn’t obvious right away, but I know he won’t go.
Instead, I give him a little more time by doing another exam. I check him for signs of neurological deficits, or damage to the cartilage in his throat, or any kind of respiratory distress. I don’t think I’m really accomplishing anything, but it makes me feel better and keeps my hands on him at the same time.
He sits quietly through it all, taking my examination as peacefully as he takes everything else I do to him.
He’s still not speaking by the end of it, though, so I pull myself into his lap, bracketing his hips with my thighs and laying my arms on his broad shoulders. Normally, the closer I get to him, the more it seems to pull him back from the brink of whatever sucks him into his own head.
I have to remind myself to be patient still, though, and ignore the flutter of panic inside my chest. I place soft kisses on his face, nuzzling into his hair and around his jaw. I scratch my nails over his scalp and dig my fingers into his tight traps.
“Come back to me, doll,” I murmur in his ear.
Slowly, he stirs.
When I finally kiss him on the mouth, he responds. It’s a gentle kiss. It’s not going anywhere, and we’re both still too drained and stressed out to be immediately popping wood, but at least he opens up for me. His warm, wet tongue responds to mine, and things start to feel a fraction more like normal.
I break off the kiss after a minute and find him looking at me with less of that vacant look in his eye.
“Talk to me.”
My thumbs glide over his eyebrows and then the arch of his cheekbones, as if I can massage all the tension out of him until he talks. His mouth falls open, though, spit glistening on his pink, plush lower lip from our kiss, and there’s a shudder as he inhales.
“I don’t know what to say, Bambi.”
His voice is so wrecked. He probably shouldn’t be using it, but I need him to not go full-zombie on me until I can get a better read on where his head’s at.
“We won.” I arch an eyebrow at him. “I know it’s kind of a hollow victory, because all we did was succeed in not getting murdered by your father, but still. We got what we wanted. You don’t have to work for him anymore. He’s leaving. It’s over.”
A long time passes before he speaks again, and it takes so much self-control not to fill that silence.
“He took my name with him,” he says. Even under the hoarseness, I can hear the raw pain in his voice. “I didn’t—How can he take my name?”
Tadhg shudders under my hands, so I pull him closer and rest his head against my chest for a second.
“I’m sorry, doll. He’s a piece of shit.” When I pull back, I look him in the eye. “You can have my name. You already belong to me a million times more than you ever belonged to him. He wants you to get a new name, I’d be fucking honored for you to share mine.”
His eyebrows raise, but I can see the words land one by one, each one a hammer blow against all that misery his father has dealt him over the years.
“Really?”
“Of course. Tadhg suffered a lot of bad shit. Savage inflicted a lot of bad shit. You’re already Sav to the guy’s at the bar, and that’s the start of your normal life. You can be Sav Alexander. I love you. You love me. Why can’t we share a name that we’re both proud of? It can be ours. Whatever that means.”
His jaw tremors, but instead of tearing up, Tadhg reaches up and pulls me into a kiss. This one is more heated than the last, our mouths wide open, tongues wrestling like we’re trying to climb inside each other.
It’s not even sexy. It’s just intense. It’s exactly what we both need.
When we break apart this time, we’re both panting, and I can feel my body waking up a little bit.
“I’m sorry,” he says.
I can’t help but scrunch up my nose at him. He apologizes for a lot of shit that isn’t his fault, and I have no idea what this one is going to be.
“For what, doll?”
“I didn’t tell him. I didn’t tell him about us. Or me. Or anything, not really. I didn’t really stand up to him. I know I was supposed to finally stand up for myself for once and end this whole big thing or get closure or be real man or whatever, and I didn’t do any of it. I just let him hurt me, like always, and stayed scared. And then you had to save me.”
“Oh, my love,” I whisper, stroking soft fingers down his cheek and over his swollen lips. “Don’t ever think that again. Promise me. You weren’t weak because you didn’t have some giant confrontation. If you’d made it any worse, he would have killed you. I didn’t need you to tell your father anything. I don’t need anything from that man. Not one damn thing. The only thing I needed was for you to come home to me, which you did. Letting me save you was the strongest thing you could have done.”
His mouth makes a little pout at this, and it would be adorable if the context wasn’t so sad. I know my words aren’t landing. I know he can’t wrap his head around this idea that he didn’t need to be the man and stand up for himself.
He doesn’t get it.
I run my nose along the bridge of his while I run my fingers through his hair and tug it hard enough to get his attention.
“I’ll tell you every day if I need to, to get it through your fucking skull. Waking up, getting up, and living your life free from him. That’s what makes you strong. This isn’t a Hallmark movie. There’s no lesson at the end. You’re done. You just have to exist. And I will save you every day, over and over, as long as you need me to. You saved me enough times; I can repay the favor.”
His frown deepens, but his mouth parts like he’s trying to breathe my words into him and accept their meaning.
“I love you, Bambi.”
I can’t help but smile whenever he says that, still.
“I know, doll. And I will let you pillow princess your way right through the rest of our lives. You fucking earned it.”
I don’t give him the chance to object. I swallow all his words in another feverish kiss, and this time I don’t let either of us come up for air. As long as he lets me, I’m going to be in charge of letting him finally get all the peace that he deserves.
Tadhg.
Sav Alexander.
None of it matters, because he’ll always be my doll.