Unexpected (The Protectors 10)

I heard muffled sounds coming from inside the house, then what sounded like dishes breaking. My instinct to make sure Nathan was okay warred with my need to escape this whole fucked-up mess.

Everett Shaw was gay and my body had decided to pick this exact moment to rejoice over that fact.

“Let’s go, son,” Shaw called to me. “Those boys will be just fine now,” he added with a smirk over his shoulder.

I caught up to him right before he reached the car. For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out what possessed me to do it, but I grabbed his arm and turned him so his back was practically pressed up against the side of the car. “I’m not your son,” I murmured. I’d meant to say the words angrily, but they definitely didn’t come out that way.

No, they came out the way I’d been feeling them.

Not pissed that he’d been talking down to me, but more like I was desperate to make sure he in no way thought of me as his kid.

I had my body practically mashed up against Shaw’s, but I couldn’t force myself to ease off.

“I’m not your son,” I repeated.

Shaw, for his part, seemed confused at first, then something switched. I would have missed his reaction if I hadn’t been standing so close to him.

Ticked-up breathing.

A slight tremor snaking through his body.

His fingers tightening on my forearm where he’d grabbed me at some point.

Lips parting just a little.

God, those lips…

Shaw managed a nod. “The things you heard in there,” he began, his eyes shifting briefly toward the house.

“Aren’t any of my business,” I finished for him. There was no missing the relief in his eyes. Desperate to get us back to where we were supposed to be, I added “Mr. President” and forced myself to step back.

He tensed up at the title and dropped his hand from my arm. His jaw tightened and he turned his head away from me so he wouldn’t be forced to look me in the eye. “I’d like you to take me somewhere, Agent Nash.”

Agent.

That was new.

“Yes, sir,” I said as all the warmth I’d been feeling evaporated. I stepped back enough so I could open the back door for him. “Where to, Mr. President?”

Shaw straightened his clothes and then walked around me and the door. His next words were so soft, I barely heard him.

“Arlington National Cemetery.”

Chapter 2

Everett

Everything will be okay, Everett. Trust me.

He’d been right.

Everything had been okay.

For a while.

Two years, to be exact.

I hadn’t been sure if Pierce had been talking about Reese when he’d said those words to me, or something else, but I hadn’t really cared. I’d held onto his words for everything they were worth.

Through Reese’s recovery.

During the continued decline of my marriage.

As my love for Pierce exploded into something I’d never known before.

It had been two years of just okay when it could have been so much more. Two years of stealing moments for quick kisses and rushed declarations of love. Even the first time we’d made love had been more about the fear of being discovered than about making our first time together perfect for one another.

But it had been perfect.

We’d somehow managed that part, even if the circumstances had been less than ideal. Fumbling, eager hands, a nondescript motel room under a fake name, and Grady keeping my security detail distracted long enough for me to experience the perfection of Pierce’s heavy body pressing mine into cheap sheets on a too-thin mattress. He’d been the first man I’d ever been with… and the only one, since there’d been no one after I’d lost him. I hadn’t even been able to touch my wife afterward. A fact she’d had no issue with, since she’d long since found a lover of her own.

One of many throughout the life of our disastrous marriage.

But it hadn’t been my wife who’d suffered as I’d relished in my newfound freedom. No, Reese had paid.

Just like he had so many times in his young life as he’d been forced to grow up in the public eye.

“Everett…”

The sound of my name felt like the softest of caresses and I closed my eyes as Pierce’s voice washed over me.

It’ll be just us soon, Everett. Sitting on some porch somewhere, staring at miles and miles of your rosebushes while we argue over what to eat for dinner and who gets to pick what show we’re going to watch.

He’d made me that promise the morning he’d left for his final deployment. We hadn’t been free to kiss, since there’d been too great of a risk of discovery, but when he’d shaken my hand and drawn me forward just a bit so the security cameras wouldn’t pick up on what he was saying to me, I’d barely managed to keep the tears at bay.