The Administration Series (226 page)

A hard point to argue with. "Warrick, the bottom line is that he told me not to let you in. I
can't
."

After a moment he nodded. "I understand." He looked past her, gathering his thoughts, then said, "Do you think he'll come round on his own?"

"I don't know." A reflexive response while she thought about what was best for Toreth. But if anyone deserved to know, it was Warrick. Toreth wasn't drinking and screwing himself into oblivion because he was telling the truth when he said he didn't want to see Warrick again. "No. I don't think he will."

She lowered her voice, keeping Toreth's secrets from the rest of the attentive office. "I've never seen him this bad. Not even when you —" She stopped. Did he know she knew? Warrick, however, merely waited for her to continue. "When you screwed the guy at the conference and I called you to warn you he was coming back to the hotel. He's . . . I can't get through to him, and I have tried — he doesn't even see me properly any more, never mind listen to me."

"Carnac is very good at what he does. The best." Warrick closed his eyes briefly. "Please, Sara. Tell me where he's staying."

Almost, she did. But Toreth would know it was her. "I can't," she said.

He caught the slip at once. "You do know then?
Tell
me."

"I can't. He'd kill me, and I'm not just saying that."

The muscles in his jaw clenched, then he nodded slowly. "Very well. You must do what you think is best, of course."

She thought that was his exit line, but he continued, his voice cold and every syllable distinct. "But I won't forget this, Sara. Do you understand? If anything happens to him, I won't forget this."

Without waiting for a reply, he turned and strode off, as quickly as he had arrived, the handful of curious spectators scattering out of his path.

For the last fortnight Toreth had been hunting for women and wanting men. However, he hadn't allowed himself even to look. That was too close to what he really wanted, which was Warrick. Still Warrick. Three weeks yesterday since he'd last seen him, and it was still Warrick.

In his hotel room, in the last minutes of clarity and sobriety for the evening, Toreth counted pluses while he brushed his hair. His arse no longer hurt so much he had to look for soft chairs wherever he went. Daedra was finally supplying again for non-medical purposes. And . . .

He dropped the brush, rested his chin on his hands and stared blindly into the mirror. There must
be
an and. There had to be. Without something else he wasn't sure he could make it out of the room and down to the bar.

He didn't really want to, anyway. He didn't want to go downstairs, he couldn't stay here. He didn't want anyone — he didn't want anyone
else
— and he couldn't sleep without it. The thoughts bounced back and forth. The mental equivalent of pacing, because he was too tired to manage the real kind.

So fucking tired.

A fortnight ago, when he'd decided to go back to I&I, he'd thought that it might help, but in the end it was only different, not better.

The first week there had been the worst, because he'd been waiting. It had taken until last Friday before the thing he'd dreaded most happened, when Warrick showed up.

There, he told his reflection. That's something to be proud about. He'd stuck to his resolution and told Warrick to go. Okay, to split hairs, he'd hidden in his office and let Sara get rid of him. The end result had been the same, though — Warrick had gone. After that, knowing Warrick wouldn't be back, he hadn't minded going to work so much.

At least it had been something to do during the day, and at night he'd fucked women, with skill and concentration. Making it last for as long as possible, so that when he finally came he was too far gone to say anything (or at least to remember saying anything) and he fell asleep immediately afterwards, which was good. For one thing, it meant he had to drink less. There — another plus.

Once or twice the women had stayed for the night, so he'd had to think of something to say to them in the morning. 'I'm late for work' had done well enough. Anyway, it was all he'd been able to manage after the moment of realisation that the warm presence beside him wasn't Warrick.

However, it felt a little better. Was
that
a plus? That it was slightly less fucking awful? At least it was better than the men, and far, far better than the nights when he hadn't been able to find anyone he could pretend he wanted. He looked down at the dressing table, unable to meet his own eyes.

Nights alone in the hotel room, wanking himself stupid over pathetic fantasies that somehow everything could still work out all right. Most of them involved killing Carnac at some point, and at least that part he enjoyed unreservedly. But afterwards he couldn't sleep, his mind too full of images of Warrick that he'd called up when he could no longer stop himself.

A few times he'd resorted to sleeping pills, and he loathed those, because whatever it said on the packet they always made him feel like shit the next day. Of course, he felt like shit anyway, but the fuzzy edges they gave the world in the morning made him feel even more out of control.

So he went out, every evening, and took different drugs that blurred things in a different way, and drank and hunted and fucked and tried to forget.

It wasn't working.

He knew that it wasn't, but there was nothing else he could do. He was hiding. Treading water, barely, waiting for things to somehow get better. Once or twice he'd weakened and thought about asking Sara to call Warrick for him, and couldn't do it.

'You want Keir to love you, more than anything you have wanted in your adult life'.

He took a deep breath. Carnac was right. He wanted it, and he couldn't have it, and so that was that.

He'd pushed Warrick away, one last time, and he'd gone. Warrick had probably been as horrified by Carnac's analysis as Toreth had. He remembered Warrick's expression in the flat — shocked, stunned into silence. God, how clearly he remembered it.

It had been nearly a week since Warrick had appeared at I&I, and there had been no word from him since. It's too late to go back, Toreth told himself, even if I wanted to.

He desperately, desperately wanted to.

He picked up the new moisturizer that Sara had bought for him — another peace offering like the endless bloody coffees. He probably should've said thanks. He didn't like the silence that had grown up between them, but he couldn't see a way round it. Open up a conversation, and she'd want to talk. First of all about whatever stupid bloody guilt trip she was on over the things she'd said to Carnac years ago. He didn't want to hear about it. It was over, he'd forgiven her, and most of all he didn't ever want to hear Carnac's name again.

Far worse, though, she'd ask about Warrick.

Still, the moisturizer had been a nice thought. He unscrewed the top and sniffed the open tube carefully. Unscented, just how he liked it. Right. Pretty up, go out, pick someone up, fuck her, don't think about waking up tomorrow.

Unfortunately, the plan forced him to focus more clearly on his face. He looked absolutely fucking awful. Absolutely fucking awful and
old
. This was what it did to you. Getting involved, giving a fuck — this was the result. After a long moment he threw the tube down, hating himself for being so weak. Weak, needy, dependent — all the things he despised in other people.

Caught in his own trap. Payne would laugh his bloody head off.

He looked at the assortment of tablets lined up on the dressing table in front of him, took a couple, and then a couple more for luck. Sweeping the rest back into the drawer, he went out to hunt.

The comm woke Sara up, chiming insistently.

"Happy birthday!" Toreth said when she opened the door and, with a rather unsteady flourish, he held out a battered bunch of flowers. Then he looked at his watch and added, "Yesterday. Fuck. I meant to come round earlier but I — oh, shit." He put his hand on the doorframe, crushing the flowers further, and shook his head.

"Christ, I'm
wrecked
," he said, sounding astonished by the discovery. "Can I sit down?"

"Of course you can. Come in."

Everything was suddenly and weirdly normal. It was just like all the uncounted times he'd turned up at her old flat, only with the novelty of his spontaneously remembering her birthday.

True, it wasn't until next month, but she felt he deserved seven out of ten for getting almost the right day of the month.

He sat on the sofa while she made coffee and put the flowers in water. When she'd finished, the sink was speckled with bruised petals and broken ends of stems — definitely not up to his usual floral standards. Still, some of them might survive. She half expected him to be asleep by the time she'd done it, but when she came through with the tray, he was teasing the cat with a piece of string.

As she entered the room, she heard him say, "Aren't
you
a vile little fucker, then?" in tones of syrupy affection. Bastard, confused by the combination of attention and lack of shouting, kept tapping the string half-heartedly and casting profoundly suspicious glances at him.

When Toreth saw her, he dropped the string hurriedly. "God, that smells good." He took the coffee and sat back. Then he looked at his watch again and frowned. "It's not your birthday, is it?"

"Next month. But thanks for the flowers, anyway."

He grinned up at her, and she noticed how contracted his pupils were. That explained the mood. "Sorry," he said. "I was sure it was today. Should know better then to trust my chronic fucking memory. Sorry I woke you up for no reason."

"It doesn't matter." She sat down next to him. "It's Friday tomorrow — I mean, today."

He smiled. "So you can go home early?"

"Yeah." She hadn't dared lately, while he'd been so locked away inside himself. "It's practically the weekend."

He gestured round the room with the mug, somehow managing not to spill it. "I like the flat. Closer to work than the other one. Bigger."

"No, it's almost exactly the same size, except that the hall and the bedroom are smaller, so there's more room in here. How did you find it?" He'd never asked her for the address.

"Called Kel. Twice, I think. Wrote a note and lost it." He chuckled. "The second time, I had to get him to give the address over the comm to the taxi. He sounded pretty pissed off."

"It
is
two in the morning."

"Yeah, well, fuck him." He looked around again, then down at the sofa. "Nice, um, suite. New?"

"Second hand." She leaned against him, pleased and relieved when he put his arm around her shoulders. "The insurance paid for new but I thought I might as well get this and keep the difference — Bastard will only scratch it all, anyway."

He nodded. "I should get some stuff. Move back in to the flat. They'll start kicking up a fuss about the expenses before long. And I hate that fucking hotel." Abruptly, the illusion of normality fractured and she could hear the misery in his voice. "Fucking hate it."

She put her hand on his chest, praying he wouldn't pull away again. "Why don't you stay here until you get the flat sorted out? I'd like you to. No spare room, but this is a sofa bed. Fee stayed over and she says it's really comfy."

"No. Thanks, but I — " He sighed and sat up, dislodging her and slopping his coffee onto the reconditioned upholstery. "I can't sleep here. Nothing personal. I can't sleep anywhere."

"Do you want some tablets? I've got some of Daedra's finest. I was having nightmares about . . . about I&I."

"Yeah? I used to have nightmares. Still do. About water. I drowned once. Twice. I — " He swallowed heavily. "Old stuff. Doesn't matter. No thanks, anyway — for the pills, I mean. Probably not a good idea. I had something already. Several somethings. I just need to find someone to fuck and then I'll be able to get some sleep."

He said it with such grim practicality that she couldn't think of anything to say except, "You don't have to go somewhere else for that."

Even as she said it, the words horrified her. She didn't know if it was because she'd broken her rule, or because in a way she hadn't — she didn't want him, not in the way she'd wanted him at his flat. She was offering a pity fuck, nothing more. The only kind of comfort he might accept.

Not, though, if he recognised what it was, which he clearly did. His eyes narrowed and he looked at her for a long moment before he said, "Do I really look that bad?"

"I didn't mean it like that." Or at least she hadn't meant to mean it like that.

He shook his head, the coldness gone in an eye blink. "'Course not. It doesn't matter. Look, thanks for the coffee. I have to go." However, he stayed on the edge of the sofa, staring into his nearly full mug.

Maybe a more physical approach would work better. Gently, she pried the mug from his hands and set it on the table. Then she turned his head, kissed him, and held his chin until, finally, his eyes met hers.

"Toreth —"

"Fine. If that's what you want. Fine."

Without waiting for a response, he pushed her down onto the sofa, coming down with her, hard and uncoordinated, nearly winding her. She squirmed underneath him, and at least he did shift to the side, letting her breathe.