Page 102 of Steady Stroke
“I remember every single kiss.”
“Fuck.” Emmett’s chest heaved, like he couldn’t breathe, but Lincoln couldn’t move a single muscle to comfort him. His entire world seemed frozen in time. “I told you I confronted Adrian over being such a jerk to you.”
He clearly remembered checking on Emmett that day. Finding him huddled in bed, as upset as he’d ever seen him—until today. “You said he told you about the drinking and the drugs, and you were mad at yourself for using coke.”
“That was only a tiny little bit of the truth.”
Lincoln’s throat closed up. “Don’t.”
“That was the night he showed me the video and told me what I did. I was absolutely sick over what I’d done. I could barely look at you that day.”
It makes sense. It makes sense, but it can’t be the truth. It can’t be Emmett’s fault that I’m like this.
“I don’t understand.” Lincoln tried to see his Emmett in the crying, shaking mess of a boy standing in front of him, but he couldn’t. All he saw was a stranger. “That happened a week after we met. We barely knew each other. Why—?” A black thought slithered into his mind and left him reeling. “Did you stay with me because you felt guilty? Because you felt sorry for me? The dizziness and sunglasses and migraines were your fault, so you’d better stick around and be nice to the invalid?”
“It was never like that!” Emmett seemed less upset now, his grief shifting into anger. Anger he had no right to feel, and it started pissing Lincoln off. “Maybe it had been only a week, but I felt so many things for you already.”
“Like what? Fucking pity?”
“I didn’t pity you then, and I don’t pity you now. I didn’t want to lose you when I’d only just found you, so I didn’t say anything.”
“No, you didn’t. You let me fall in love with you, instead.”
“Which is why I’m telling you now! I love you, Lincoln, and I want everything we talked about this weekend. I want a husband and a house and kids, and I think we could have all that together, but you had to know this first. You deserve the truth.”
“Oh, I see. I deserve the truth now that you know I’m a keeper, but not six weeks ago. Not when you weren’t sure you wanted to be saddled with my issues for the rest of your life.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“It sure as fuck sounds like what you meant.” Lincoln was losing control of his temper. Everything was hot and tight and he really, really wanted to hit something. And he didn’t want it to be Emmett. Not ever. Not even after all of this.
“I’m sorry. I am so sorry, Lincoln. Tell me how tofix this.”
“I don’t know if you can.”
Emmett’s head jerked as if he’d been slapped.
“I need to leave.” He turned and stalked to the front door.
“Lincoln, please.”
A hand closed over his forearm. Lincoln yanked away so violently that Emmett stumbled to his knee. He didn’t pause to catalogue the heartbreak in Emmett’s eyes, or the way he stayed down, like a wounded puppy. He slammed his way out the door and walked away from the best thing he’d ever had.
Emmett sat on the floor, arms around his knees, and rocked. He couldn’t do anything else while his heart broke apart and drifted away on the winds of grief. He’d known his confession would hurt Lincoln, but he hadn’t been prepared for how much seeing Lincoln’s pain would hurt Emmett. How Lincoln’s anger and grief and confusion would turn into sharp little knives that stabbed Emmett over and over again.
He didn’t know how long he sat there before Aunt Beatrice came home and started mothering him. He told her the truth, too, and ended up curled in her arms, sobbing on her chest, while she whispered over and over that everything would be okay.
Emmett said nothing, because he knew the bitter truth.
Without Lincoln, nothing would be okay again.
And maybe that was exactly what Emmett deserved.
Lincoln spent the rest of the day in bed fighting a stress-induced migraine. He snapped at Roxy when she asked about Emmett, so she shut the door and left him alone. His phone rang once, so he turned that off too. He was in no conditionto speak to another human being, much less one he cared about.
He tried to sleep, but his dreams were shadowed and angry. He saw a car spinning out. Saw Emmett singing in a truck’s cab. Saw himself falling down over and over because of his vertigo. Saw him and Emmett lounging in bed naked, happy. He woke in the middle of the night, migraine gone, so he went out to the couch and watched crappy movies until dawn.
When Roxy came out to make coffee, she gave him a wide berth. Guilt made him call out to her, and he didn’t protest when she wrapped him up in a hug. She didn’t ask what was wrong, and he adored her for it. After a while she brought them both coffee and toasted English muffins with jelly, and they watched a morning talk show while they ate.
