Page 172 of Compromised
"Don't," Alistair said.
"Good," Lucien said. "I was going to say you look good."
Alistair held his gaze.
Then he stepped forward and put his arms around his brother with the way someone who had been preparing for this moment for four days and in the event found that preparation had been entirely insufficient for the actual experiencing of it.
Lucien held on.
They stood in the doorway of the stone coastal safe house for a long time and said nothing.
Tav remained in the kitchen.
He could hear them — not words, just the presence settling, two people recalibrating around each other after a long absence. He made tea with the deliberate method and gave them the time it required.
When they came inside, Lucien composure, in good order and was slightly surprised by that. He fixed on the safe house interior he had been imagining this location for five years and was now conducting a rapid assessment of reality versus imagination.
"It's smaller than I thought," he said.
"It was your suggestion," Alistair said.
"I know. I had a different sense of it from the outside."
"It's warm," Tav said, from the kitchen.
Lucien watched him. The amber eyes — Alistair's eyes in a slightly look. The same deep assessment, more heavily weighted by experience.
"Tav," he said.
"Yes."
"Thank you," Lucien said. "For—" "For all of it. Specifically for being the person you are in the context of this situation."
"That's a very gratitude," Tav said.
"I was trying to be precise." He looked between them. "I know what Alistair is like when he's decided something. I could see it in the surveillance data. And I was—" He stopped. "I was glad. That's not a complicated sentence but it contains several years of hoping."
Alistair was looking at the floor with the expression of someone receiving something significant. Tav handed Lucien a cup.
They sat at the kitchen table — the three of them, a configuration that had not previously existed and was adjusting to its own existence with the care of something new.
"The crossword," Tav said.
Lucien looked at him.
"Seven across," Tav said. "Elias got it."
Lucien was very still.
"The photograph in the archive materials," Alistair said quietly. "We found it."
Lucien watched the table. At the cup in his hands. At a point somewhere beyond both of them.
"SAFE," he said.
"SAFE," Tav confirmed.
Lucien was quiet for a long time.
