Chapter Fifteen #2
That night, they had dinner after work, and they laughed and laughed for hours. It had been the first moment’s peace that he’d experienced in forever.
There had been no need to numb pain, because it all disappeared. It melted away, like it had never existed.
At work the next day, Corbin brought him a coffee, and they started a case.
When he became his backup, instantaneously, he became his best friend.
That was a miracle in Alex’s life.
In that moment, he knew that what they had was special, and something so unique. It was more than what he had with Noah.
Until it wasn’t anything.
And he needed to find out what he’d done to make the man not want to be near him.
If he didn’t find out, it would continue to tear him apart—like his whole life had.
Finding Corbin hadn’t been easy either. The man was trying to evade him.
He’d called down to the desk, and pretended to be Corbin, once he figured the man wouldn’t leave the hotel.
He told him that he’d lost his key, and could he get another when he got there.
They didn’t even question it when he flashed his badge, and said that he was Corbin Price. The shift change had happened, and the night crew didn’t know any different.
They passed it right off—not even checking to make sure he was who he said he was.
An FBI badge got you through many closed doors. Now, it would get him into Corbin’s.
With the room number, and a key in case he tried to hide, Alex headed back upstairs.
Standing outside the man’s new room, it was now or never. If he said nothing, he knew it was all over. Deep down, he found that little hope, and reached for it.
His heart hurt too much.
He’d lost Noah, too.
All he knew was the man had a dream about his dead husband, and he was running.
He could save him if he let him. In the process, it might just save Alex, too.
Now, he had to try.
Going up to the door, he began banging on it. No one answered, but he knew he was in there. His whole being told him that he was hiding.
As people looked out of their doors, he held up his badge.
“FBI. Go back into your rooms.”
Oh, and they did.
Before he could really violate the man’s privacy by using the key, the door also opened, and Corbin looked horrified at what was going on.
Well, he should be.
He was horrified, too.
The man didn’t even give him a chance.
That was shitty.
Even if their time together was short, this had been cruel and heartless. It wasn’t lost on him that now, he knew how the people he fucked and ran felt. Maybe it was like his grandfather told him.
He deserved everything that happened to him, and that no one would find any value in him.
“Knock it off!” Corbin hissed, as Alex pushed past him, and stood his ground in front of him.
He wasn’t backing down.
“I’m not going away,” he said. “Not until you give me a good reason why you’re saying goodbye to me. We had something good!”
Oh, Jesus.
This was a flashback.
Truthfully, it was one that he didn’t need.
Will had said something similar when he’d found him after his assault. Corbin had shoved him out of his life, and Will didn’t tolerate it.
That had been one of the things he loved most about Will. He wasn’t a coward like him, and he kept fighting no matter what. He hung in there, even when his feet had been kicked out from under him.
“Can you imagine how shitty it feels to have Elizabeth pull you aside and tell you that your partner wants out? Tell me what I did,” he said, angrily. “Face me, and say it to me!”
Corbin knew that Alex hadn’t done anything wrong. In fact, his only sin was reminding him of his husband.
The scent.
The fire.
The passion.
The attraction.
It was just too much for him.
The only difference was that Will never got drunk and tore into him.
This was all Alex, but still, Corbin knew he deserved it.
He raged on.
“What did I do?” he asked. “What could I have possibly done to make you terminate our partnership? I did nothing bad today. I was good. I was on my best behavior.”
Corbin was alarmed by that.
It sounded…wrong.
He sounded like a man on the edge, and this shouldn’t push him over like this. Only, it was.
They were only partners.
Right?
Now, he was wondering if Alex felt something more for him, and he’d never noticed.
Had he been too lost in his own trauma?
“You could have come to me, and we could have worked it out! I respected you enough to do whatever it took to make this work! I was trying.”
Oh, boy.
This felt like relationship talk.
“Alex, it just isn’t working out,” he stated.
And that annoyed Alex to no end.
When he did something wrong, he’d fix it. He’d pay for it, but he needed to be told what it was. There was nothing worse than not knowing why you were hated.
Why you were being abandoned.
He spent his whole life like that, and he needed to know what he’d done to Corbin.
“Why?” he asked.
When Corbin didn’t answer, but instead moved away from him, and closer to the bed, Alex followed.
“Just tell me why you’re ditching me. Tell me why you couldn’t just tell me, so we could work through it together!”
This was all new territory for Corbin.
The bottom line was that he felt way too much for this man. That was why he needed to run. Not only did he smell like his dead husband, but the fight in him…
It was the same.
Will had been an attorney, and he never backed down during a fight. He’d stand his ground, and let Corbin cling to that strength.
Some people were just stronger and tougher. He saw it in Alex, too.
If that wasn’t bad enough, he was also attracted to him, his body, and his intelligence.
The color of his eyes made him feel helpless.
The way he smiled twisted him up inside.
It made his heart do a little skip in his chest at the worst possible moments.
Like now.
He was flushed, and his hair was standing up from running his hands through it. That little charge to his body made him want to run more. In the back of his head, there was what his mother said.
He was running because this man made him feel again.
And he wasn’t allowed to keep living.
Because Will hadn’t.
What he wanted to do was take a chance, but he couldn’t. This was a straight man. Yeah, they could be friends, but Corbin suspected that he wanted more than that. If he was going to risk it all, it had to be a sure thing.
It wouldn’t work out.
“You should go,” he said. “I don’t want you near me right now,” Corbin stated. “You’re drunk and disorderly. Don’t make this mistake, Alex. Don’t lose your job over nothing.”
Oh, well, mistakes were his whole identity.
He lived by the compassion of the people who saved him. What was one more embarrassment in a long line of them for him?
He was leaving the FBI anyway.
Alex was too tired to keep doing this. That was the bottom line. He’d lost two great partners in the FBI, and two men he felt something for too.
There was no way he could do this again. It took until Corbin showed up to feel alive again. That was a year and a half of emptiness that nearly broke him.
Plus, this was more than ‘nothing’ to him.
It was everything, and while he didn’t understand how, that didn’t make it less true. Instinct told him to fight for Corbin, and hope he’d do the same for him.
“I’m not going until you tell me what is making you ditch our partnership.”
Corbin lied.
It was all he could do so the ugliness didn’t come out, and he wasn’t splayed out for the world to see. He was so broken and unfixable.
So, he did the one thing that he knew would hurt the most. Out of trying to protect himself, he hurt an innocent man.
He aimed at Alex, and let that arrow fly. Oh, and it was a direct hit.
“THIS. THIS BEHAVIOR!”
He saw the flash of pain, the hurt, and knew that was a low blow. Alex had nothing to do with this because he was the broken one.
Clearly.
At his words, it made its mark.
That ended it for Alex.
It broke the last piece of him. He was exactly what everyone told him he was.
Nothing.
“Yeah, you’re not the first one to feel that way,” he said, exhaustedly. “It was only a matter of time before you hated me too,” he said softly. “Goodbye, Corbin,” he said. “Goodbye.”
At his words, that shook Corbin. Oh, and he really didn’t like the way that sounded.
Corbin had once been at rock bottom.
He knew the echoes there.
There was that awareness that made him worry about Alex’s well-being. It turned on, and in that moment, he couldn’t live with another person’s end on his shoulders.
AGAIN.
That was a burden that would do him in this time.
As he went to turn to walk away, and out the door, Corbin grabbed his arm to stop him.
And it went downhill.
Fast.
Alex reacted, but Corbin was bigger. He shoved, and managed to get Corbin off balance. He moved, pulling Alex with him until they both fell onto the bed.
Someone fought, and then, he found himself with his hands trapped and pinned to the bed. Alex couldn’t move.
Now, they were pressed together.
Where Corbin expected rage, there wasn’t any. Instead, there was sadness.
There was exhaustion.
There was…emptiness.
Oh, and Corbin knew what all of that felt like. He was hollow and broken.
“Why don’t you like me?” Alex asked. “We have a partnership. I thought I mattered.”
Corbin was staring at him, trying not to think about this man’s body against his. Only, he was human, and so lonely inside from always running.
If he closed his eyes, he could feel the peace of being near this man, and he didn’t understand it. It had been so long since he’d felt anything, let alone this.
For the vow he made to Will, he’d hurt this man too. He went to be brutal, but that’s not what came out.
“You remind me of my husband. That’s why. It’s too close to the fire,” he admitted. “Being near you hurts me in ways you’ll never understand.”
Alex was tipsy, but he was listening.
Oh, he could hold his alcohol, but honestly, that sounded like to him like the man didn’t hate him.
“Do you still love him?” Alex asked.
Tears filled Corbin’s eyes.
“Yes.”