A Cowboy's Home (17 page)

Ethan didn’t call him on the fact he hadn’t
answered what happened back in 2004. “Undercover,” Ethan said.

Justin nodded. “I came off my last op,
working with a guy from another team. He was sent to Montana to
take out someone. I saw the intel, realized it was Adam, followed
them, and then killed him and the other guy with him.”

“The two dead men,” Ethan summarized. “You
were protecting Adam.”

“I had to. I didn’t know he was alive before
then, I swear. But the intel said he was regaining memories, that
recalling what had happened to him put him on a kill list. So I did
what I needed to do. I messaged him, told him to run, that he was
in danger, and to meet me in Chicago.”

“Was that was you on the tape, in Chicago?
The one who stopped that man beating Adam to death?”

Justin nodded. “Webb. He was another member
of the same team was sent to finish him. I pulled him off, called
for help.”

“Did you kill the guy who hurt Adam in
Chicago?” Ethan leaned forward with fire in his eyes.

What should Justin say? Justin declined to
answer verbally and just nodded. He expected Ethan to have some
kind of reaction—disgust, maybe? Congratulations? Instead he sat
back in the chair.

“You got to him before me,” he said with
feeling. “So, now you’re done,” he summarized.

“I wish it was that easy. I know too much,
about the kinds of corners the authorities cut just to get the job
done. Doesn’t matter we saved lives. We became killers.”

“Four of you. Two you killed, so that leaves
one? Who is that?”

“You don’t need to know.”

Ethan didn’t back down. “Is Adam safe?”

Justin realized one thing at that moment:
Adam was more important to Ethan than Justin himself was.

As it should be.

Still, that dug right into his heart and made
it hurt so much more. He stopped, because what he had to say next
was so bad, but he couldn’t find any words to make it better.

Ethan was insistent. “Justin? Keep
talking.”

“You know what they said?” Justin gave a
bitter laugh, but he only laughed because he didn’t want the grief
to take over. He stopped again.

Ethan will hate me.

“Who said what? Ethan reached out and grasped
Justin’s hand, and for a second Justin held on tight, then shoved
him away before Ethan could do it to him.

“When I woke up in the hospital, I was in a
coma, burns so bad it wasn’t certain I would live, and they told me
Adam was dead. I grieved, and blamed myself. I still blame myself.
It’s right that I take that on myself.” He paused as he considered
what to say next. “I wanted to die, and then I wanted to live just
to hurt the people who’d killed Adam. That need for revenge pulled
me through over two years of pain and healing.”

“And then what? Why didn’t you come
home?”

Justin sighed. “At first, when you weren’t in
the hospital there, when no family was there for me, I couldn’t
understand it. Then I was told I was in WITSEC, that I was a
primary witness. I mourned that so fucking hard.” He looked right
at Ethan, wanted Ethan to know how much it had killed him not to
come home.

“What changed from you being in WITSEC and
then becoming… what you became?”

“A killer. You
can
say it out
loud.”

“Jesus, Justin,” Ethan cursed, and this time
tears filled his eyes.

Justin had to harden his heart if he was
going to get this story out in full. “Saunders was with me the
whole time. You have to understand he became my focus, my family,
and just after my eighteenth birthday, when I was being released
from the hospital, he gave me two options—a safe house and new
identity in South Carolina on one hand, a list with five names on
it in the other. I had a choice. I could give up and hide, or I
could work with him undercover and at the same time find ways to
avenge Adam’s death. Get my own revenge. It was my way of
atoning.”

“You blame yourself? How was what happened to
you and Adam your fault?” Ethan asked in a tone of complete
disbelief.

Justin shook his head. “Fuck you, Ethan. You
have to know by now that I was the one who rode off that day. Adam
followed
me
. If he’d stayed with you, he would have been
okay, but no, I had some childish freak-out over my brother and my
best friend being a couple, and Adam wanted to explain.”

Ethan rested a hand on Justin’s leg. “You
can’t think like that.”

“I can.”

They stared at each other for a long time,
Justin stubbornly refusing any support from Ethan.

“The five on your list,” Ethan said,
cautiously, “the ones who hurt you and Adam? What happened to
them?”

“Four of them are dealt with.”

“You killed them as well.” Now Ethan’s voice
was dead, and his eyes looked empty of everything, including any
affection or love for his brother.

Justin said nothing.

After Ethan and Justin had another staring
battle of sorts, Ethan finally asked, “And that’s the end of
it?”

“Not exactly. Rob and I are left of our
team.”

“And that means?”

“It means I’m under no illusions that the man
who we reported to, Clarke, has every intention of surgically
removing me after what I did to Saunders and Webb. After I went
rogue. I’m okay with however that plays out.” Justin wasn’t
answering the question as such; he wasn’t alive inside, so there
was no point in running if Rob came for him. He just hoped it would
be after he’d managed to cross that last name off his list.

Ethan sat back with a huff of anger. Then his
expression softened and he looked stricken. “Can you ever come
home?”

That was a leading question. “No.” Ethan
wouldn’t drop his gaze. “I still have work to do,” Justin finally
said.

Ethan placed a finger under Justin’s chin and
tipped his head to look up at Ethan. “What do you mean?”

It seemed
like everyone had made themselves scarce so the brothers had
privacy, but God, Justin wished there was someone else there to
break the intensity in Ethan.

He wished Sam was there, with his blue eyes
so filled with compassion. He needed that barrier back, needed
Sam’s touch. He didn’t even question why, just accepted that Sam
settled him.

Justin raised a hand and gripped Ethan’s
wrist, pulling away the fingers that tipped his chin. “What do I
mean? It’s simple. Along the way, inside all the other shit I did,
I made those men pay for killing Adam,” he said. “All but one.”

Jamie Crane is still on my list. The last one
to deal with before I can disappear.

Pain banded Justin’s skull and he closed his
eyes.

“Justin?” Ethan looked like he was going to
cry.

Justin couldn’t watch his brother in tears
again. He wasn’t that far away from Justin, and his hands were in
fists again on his knee. Justin decided to change the subject.

“Tell me about Adam. I saw the way you held
him, and I guess he loves you back. That’s good news. You were
always soul mates,” Justin rambled, even though the words hurt
him.

And not because of some stupid petty jealousy
that he’d originally felt at sixteen. It was just that Adam had
come home, alive. He pushed it all aside, and concentrated on the
here and now.

Adam would be loaded down with agony and pain
if he got his memories back, and Justin wished
like hell
he could make sure Adam never
remembered a thing.

“The amnesia is a bastard,” Ethan said, like
it was an aside. At least he’d stopped crying, now sitting there
focused and with probably a million questions. “Total. He’s having
to rebuild it all. But it’s okay, because now you’re here, you can
fill in the blanks. Hell, I want you to fill in the blanks, little
brother.”

“
No
.” Justin emphasized the word. If
Adam wasn’t scarred by the terrors Justin had seen, then Justin
wasn’t wrecking his life. Part of him, the small part that was the
younger, innocent man, was jealous that Adam had a home, had
Ethan.

“He has so many missing
memories.”

“I wish that was me,” Justin murmured under
his breath. The idea of memory loss, of forgetting all he had seen,
all that had been done to him, sounded like a good thing.

“No, you don’t. Most of the time he’s fine,
but sometimes I see him just staring, and I know he’s recalled
something that hurts him or makes him sad. I wouldn’t wish it on my
closest enemy.”

“I’m sorry,” Justin said uselessly.

“But now you’re here, and we can sort this
out.”

Justin looked at him steadily. “It’s not that
easy.”

“Yes, it is.”

“I killed two of the Unit. Webb went for me,
shot me in the thigh, and I manipulated it so Saunders shot him in
the face. Then I shot Saunders before he could shoot me. Right
here.” He tapped his forehead right above his eyes. “I wanted
answers. They just wanted me dead.”

“Self-defense.”

Justin shrugged. “I’m leaving as soon as I
can.”

“What do you mean?” Ethan sounded desperate.
“You only just got here.”

“Too many people know: Gabe, Sam, Adam, Dad,
you. And if Rob figures out I’m here….”

“This Rob, why does he have to do what he’s
told and kill you? Can’t he be reasoned with? Paid off? The ranch
has some money now. We could all pay in?”

Justin shook his head. “We never knew who was
pulling the strings ultimately—the only name we have is Clarke, but
it’s lost in politics—what we did has to die with us to keep the
country safe, to keep the president with plausible deniability. We
knew that, signing up. I’m lucky to have made it this far.”

Ethan stood and began pacing from bed to door
and back again. With each turn he opened his mouth to ask
something, but the words never fully formed, and instead all he was
doing was cursing as he walked. Ethan stopped at the bed again and
sat down. He looked tight, holding himself rigid. “Then tell me
what the fuck happens next. Who do I need to call?”

“No one, and I guess the welcome-back hugs
are finished, then?” Justin’s chest tightened. He didn’t want to
answer questions, and certainly not any from his utterly focused
big brother or anyone else Ethan felt should be involved. He pushed
aside blankets and stumbled to stand, leaning heavily on the bed,
forcing away dizziness, and hoping he stayed standing.

“Let me call Ryan. This is something the
sheriff could help with. He’ll know what to do.”

“No.”

“Jesus, Justin, think about this.”

“I said no.” Justin moved away from the wall
and was finally standing without support.

“Stop me!” Ethan suddenly shouted, so close
that Justin could see the temper in his eyes.

“I could.”

Ethan shoved him then, nothing too major, but
enough to push Justin off-center, make him grab for the back of the
chair Ethan had been sitting on, miss it, and end up in a pathetic
heap on the floor.

Ethan was there in a second. “Shit, I’m
sorry. Fuck, Justin…”

Justin batted Ethan’s hands away and
crab-walked back to the wall, leaning there and resting his hands
in his lap.

They both breathed heavily, staring at each
other.

Ethan was the first to blink. “Tell me
everything,” he said as he stayed there in an awkward crouch, no
more than two feet away from Justin.

“I wouldn’t know where to start.”

“The beginning.”

Shame and grief poured into Justin. “That’s
the very worst place to start.”

Ethan moved to sit next to him against the
wall, bumping shoulders and staying there as if he needed the
reassurance of Justin being right next to him. “I love you, Justin.
I missed you every goddamn day. And Gabe, he was the one left
behind when you and Adam vanished.
Jesus
.”

“And Dad?”

Ethan hung his head and sighed noisily. “Dad
found his safe place, where he could handle the grief of losing
you.”

Justin wanted to ask what Ethan meant, but he
feared opening a huge can of worms because Ethan’s tone was flat
and didn’t appear to invite comment.

“I had to go.” That was all Justin could say.
All he
would
say.

“Why? Adam said he saw you burning. He
thought you were dead.”

Justin banged his head against the wall and
immediately regretted the action. His head should stay completely
still and not have contact with walls in any way, shape, or
form.

“There’s no point in telling you anything
else, Ethan, even if I could.”

“Where were you?
Twelve years
. When
were you planning on coming home?”

“Jesus, Ethan, I never intended coming home.”
He had to share that truth with his brother, but he saw the way
Ethan hunched in on himself. Justin was hurting him, but how else
could he get the man to back the hell away from him?

They were inches apart then. Ethan’s eyes
were stormy and sparking with emotion when he spoke. “Please don’t
leave.”

Justin stared at him for the longest time,
but an explanation wasn’t on the tip of his tongue, wasn’t even in
his head. He’d stayed alive so long by keeping quiet, and he wasn’t
about to let Ethan back into his life just because of the way Ethan
looked at him with tears in his eyes. “I can’t do this. I’ll kill
Sam for getting Gabe involved, for bringing you all here.”

“This isn’t Sam’s fault.”

“He should have left me to die up there,”
Justin said. Then he levered himself up, using the wall, and
Ethan’s shoulder, and limped to the bed.

“Justin, I need to know what happened. I need
to fill in the blanks.”

“And I
need
to go,” Justin muttered,
more to himself than to Ethan. His head pounded as though he had a
head rush. Dizzy nausea swamped him. Fucking fever had laid him
out..

“Please, Justin, we just got you back.”

“You didn’t, though. You don’t have me back.
I can’t stay.”