36. Talon
thirty-six
Talon
M isely was three seconds away from losing it and I was furious. More angry than I’d been before, than I’d been since the start of this mess. How fucking dare Birdie speak to her that way? Treat her that way? As if she were some common whore. As if she were less than. And how dare Misely let her?
In the entire time I’d known her, she was more than willing to go blow for blow with me, no hesitation. She never backed down from an argument and she never let me have the last word. But for Birdie? She folded so damn easily. Like she didn’t even have it in her to fight.
“Why do you let her talk to you like that?” I demanded, looking to where Misely sat on the bed, her head in her hands.
“Like what? She has every right.” Her meekness only served to infuriate me further.
“No. She. Doesn’t. Nobody has any right.”
“You do all the time,” she scoffed, not looking up.
“Misely, look at me.” She didn’t.
Crouching down in front of her, I placed my hands on her knees, forcing her to meet my gaze beneath the curtain of her hair.
“Nobody gets to disrespect you, baby. None of this was your fault. I shouldn’t have…fuck, I shouldn’t have involved you at all. This is on me.”
She sighed, dropping her hands. Unable to help myself, I grabbed them, running my thumb over her supple skin.
“Maybe it’s your fault that we ended up here. But Birdie was right about one thing.”
“I highly doubt that sweetheart, but I’ll humor you. About what?”
There was a flash of self-deprecation over her face. “I am selfish. I always have been. I go after anything that will make me feel good. So, she’s right. I couldn’t help myself.” She was looking at me like I was one of her sweet treats, one that she would regret later.
My mouth was on hers in seconds, my heart beating at an odd pace in my chest. Against her lips I murmured, “And that’s your right. After everything you’ve been through in your life, all the ways you do good by others. The way you do good by even me… You deserve to feel good too, sweetheart. I’m glad I’ve been able to give you that.”
Fuck .
Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything. Because that was too much; revealed too much of my own feelings. Delicate hands came up on either side of my face, the tips of her fingers tracing over my skin, her forehead pressing into mine.
"You're not supposed to be nice to me, Talon MacArthur." Her eyes were shimmering, but this time the tears didn't fall and I couldn't find the words to tell her that I never wanted to be anything but nice to her.
We sat that way for a while, quietly holding one another in that way, breathing each other in. I was doomed.
The last thing I needed was my brother’s smirk waiting right outside the bedroom door first thing the following morning. Misely was still sleeping; we’d been up late, not speaking but just holding one another. I’d never shared that kind of intimacy with another before, never bothered to try, but with Misely there was an instinctive drive to comfort her and draw comfort from her in turn.
I was gearing up to go on a run, desperate to burn off some excess energy when I ran face first into Milo in the hallway. “Same old Talon. You’ve never been able to let go of your precious habits. Morning run?”
I grunted, trying to move past him. Our combined width did not allow us to stand shoulder to shoulder in the small hall. All it took was one small step and he was blocking my path. “Great,” he said, that stupid fucking smirk growing into a grin. “I’ll join you. I could use the stretch.”
We made our way out to the front porch, both choosing to forgo coats, running the first five minutes down his incredibly long driveway in silence. I had to admit that the location he’d chosen to settle was exceptional. Though there was a bite in the winter air, it wasn’t so bad that I wanted to turn around and go back. It had a crisp freshness to it that enhanced the run instead of making it unbearable.
The sound of the wind rustling the branches of the snow drooped trees and a woodpecker somewhere in the distance was all that could be heard over the rhythm of our breathing. Running with him took me back to memories of a sixteen year old Milo, joining me every morning—doing anything to get out of the house and away from Kyle, who was likely still drunk or high, stumbling around the house in his stupor.
I was happy then to give Milo some reprieve from it all. Let him pretend for an hour that he wasn’t a drug dealer and his parents weren’t dead and the man who was raising him wasn’t some junkie. I was still so naive back then. Trying to shelter him even when he was already waist deep in the bullshit.
Coming to a sudden stop, I bent down, placing my hands on my knees and drawing in sharp breaths. The air had gone from refreshing to suffocating in the span of mere minutes.
“Getting too much for you, old man?” Milo laughed, jogging back to where I stood.
Flipping him off, I attempted to shake off the uprising emotions that were sweeping over me. My efforts were unsuccessful. Guilt, shame, and a deep, pressing sense of sadness had my throat closing up. All things I’d swallowed down for years , bubbling up to the surface all at once.
Seeming to have sensed my distress, Milo’s eyes turned in. “Hey, you all right man?”
It was too much. Too heavy.
“I-I tried.” I gasped out, my lungs burning. I couldn’t breathe. Why couldn’t I breathe? My heart was beating a mile a minute, like it was trying to escape from my body. Vertigo nearly sent me to the ground. I tried fruitlessly to start counting in my head— one, two, three, four…one, two, three…
“Tried what?” Milo approached slowly, patting a cautious hand to my back. “Hey, c’mon, breathe.” The amount of panic in his voice leveled me enough that I was able to blurt out the thoughts and regrets clawing through my mind.
“When Mom and Dad died. I tried , Lo. I tried to get us out of there. I wrote to CPS, I called the cops, I went to the fucking police station. Counselors at school, the principal. Nobody believed me. They thought I was making up stories because I was grieving or whatever the fuck.
“I tried to look out for you, I swear I did. I didn’t just give up. I guess I—I’m sorry. I’m sorry you had to be raised by Kyle. I’m sorry I couldn’t do more. I’m sorry I couldn’t be a dad to Leo. I’m sorry I got his mom and him involved. I’m sorry I dragged Misely into it. I’m sorry I’m here, fucking up your first fucking chance at normal. I tried. I tried. I tried .”
I don’t know when the tears started, but I was on my knees, snow soaking through my sweatpants, and sobbing. I couldn’t remember a time in my life where I’d been reduced into such a mess. Not since Mom and Dad, but even then it had mostly been anger that they were gone. An anger that had been my constant companion ever since, that Kyle molded and weaponized to his advantage. This feeling was more like a deep well of agony that had been growing with every passing year, sending me into a darkness I didn’t know how to crawl out of.
But then Milo dropped down next to me, his hand still between my shoulder blades. He worked his way around until he was in front of me, placing both palms on my shoulders.
“I know , Tal.”
I sniffled, fighting back embarrassment for looking so fucking weak in front of him. “What?”
“I know you tried. Maybe not about what you did to get us out of there, but I know you did your best to look out for me.”
Searching his eyes, hazel like Mom's, I saw nothing but sincerity. “I could’ve done more. About Kyle. And Bri.”
He tilted his head and raised a brow a smidge. “Bri is a whole other monster, but part of me doesn’t blame her for it. There’s more going on there. And what could you do about Kyle that you hadn’t already tried?”
“Something. Anything.”
“You did.”
I blinked, not understanding. “What do you mean?”
His infuriating smirk returned. “I know I gave you shit last night. Rightfully so—I’m pissed you’re here. Or at least, pissed you came to try to get me to go back. But…I took the night to think and I guess I realized that if you had wanted to, you would’ve found me much faster than you did.”
“You didn’t exactly make it easy. Witness protection?”
He shrugged. “Still. You chose not to find me.”
I didn’t say anything. Because of course he was right.
“I always wanted you to have a normal life.” The panic attack had begun to subside, my heart rate slowly going back to normal. Forcing myself to take a few more deep, stabilizing breaths, I stood and offered a hand to my brother. “But when Kyle brought Leo into it…He is just a kid, Lo. Just an innocent little kid.”
When we were both standing again, he slapped a hand on my shoulder. “I know. We will figure it all out. And for the record, I do have a normal life now, for the most part. Wish I didn’t have a fake name, but things are good. I love it here. I love my wife.”
“Wife?” I’d seen the photos on the mantle but had assumed they were staged.
“Soon to be legally binding.” His grin split into a smile. “As far as anyone in these parts knows, we are married. But I want to marry her for real. I just…Birdie is everything. I want to spend forever with her. I want to rewrite our last name for the better.”
My throat tightened again, a niggling sense of familiarity pressing into me. He must’ve seen it because he chuckled. “You’ve got it bad, huh?”
“What the hell are you talking about?” I grumbled, staying focused on the trees as we walked back toward his cabin.
“You’re in love with her.” He said it so confidently, like there wasn’t even a possibility he could be wrong. When I didn’t say anything, he laughed again. “You left the door open last night and I saw you with her. Saw how you spoke to her. I know exactly how it feels to want to protect her the way you were. You’re down bad , brother. And I gotta say, it looks damn good on you.”
“What does?”
“Needing someone.”