Page 32 of Cohesion

Jericho closed the door so that it couldn’t close itself. Sudden noises weren’t a good idea. He snagged two clean towels from the cabinet and then climbed into the tub with slow, calculated movements, keeping his eyes fixed on Peyton. If the ex-soldier went for him, he wanted to be ready. If this was what he thought, instinct would be riding Peyton more than rational thought. And there was a coiled power under those muscles, a hint of a dangerous strength. Adrenalin only ever fuelled that.

He sat on the other side, glad that it was a pretty big spa bath, and he was able to leave space around Peyton. A safety bubble. He bet all of them could fit into this thing. Not a lot of room to spare, but that wasn’t the point of sharing a bath, was it?

Jericho checked him over, looking for any injuries, self-inflicted or not. There weren’t any visible scrapes or bruises he could see. No blood. It was hard to tell without getting Peyton unfurled so he could inspect him fully, but he was satisfied that there wasn’t anything that required a trip to emergency.

He remembered nights sitting with Hunter, holding him so that he couldn’t hurt himself. Often it wasn’t intentional. The thrashing meant that nothing and no one was safe, including themselves.

The silence of the night air blanketed them, crashing waves a soothing dull noise in the distance. Jericho could be patient, and wait as long as necessary.

It took time, but Peyton’s shoulders eventually lowered, the shivering slowing until it was gone.

“Peyton,” Jericho said quietly. When Peyton didn’t flinch from the sound of his voice, Jericho felt confident enough to move.

He draped one towel over Peyton’s shoulders and the other over his lap before he slid an arm around him. Peyton immediately turned into him, hands fisting against his chest. Jericho buried his nose in Peyton’s hair. He smelled like shampoo, sweat, and fear.

“How do you do it?” Peyton whispered roughly.

“I know I’m a talented guy, but I’m not a mind reader.” A shame, really. Would have been a pretty fucking handy talent to have. Especially in situations like this.

“When you’re undercover, you do bad things, right?”

“Depends on your definition of bad. But sure. And while I’m not undercover too. I’m an equal opportunity kind of agent.” He did what needed to be done, whether he was himself or someone else. For the greater good. Jericho didn’t stop to second guess himself; there was no point. He didn’t hurt innocent people, and he didn’t kill anyone who didn’t deserve it. That’s as far as his line was drawn.

“And you don’t care?”

Jericho carded his fingers through Peyton’s hair, gently untangling it when he snagged on a knot. “What makes you think I don’t care?”

“You brush everything off so easily.”

“Do I?” Jericho murmured. He curled a thick strand of hair around his index finger, watching it slide across his skin. Like soft silk. “I know what’s at stake if I don’t do my job. The innocent people whose lives get destroyed. I’ll take a few hits to prevent that. I’ll deal out a few hits too.” More than a few. Nothing more satisfactory than putting an asshole on the ground. Or six feet under it.

“How?”

“I think I need you to elaborate for me, sweetheart.” How what?

“How do you live with knowing that you’re the reason someone is dead?”

Sounded less a question for him and one more directed at Peyton himself. “It’s a last resort. We have lawyers on call for a reason, and we do our best to let the legal system work the way it’s supposed to. Even after that, there are avenues we go down. We aren’t hired killers, and we still operate within the law.” They straddled the line, and it depended what day of the week it was as to which side they were on, but regardless of their angle, they were sanctioned, and they always did it for the right reason. Jericho and Hunter made sure of it. For some of them, the team was a place where they could find themselves,bethemselves. “I don’t kill anyone who doesn’t deserve it.” He remembered the face of every single one of them. And the faces of their victims. Knowing who they were, what they were responsible for? He could live with their blood on his hands.

“Does it get easier?”

“I think you already know the answer to that one.” It was nevereasyto take a life. Some hurt more than others but not for the reasons Peyton thought. The only regrets that Jericho held onto was when it took too long to take a target down, and others got hurt when he could have put a stop to it earlier.

“They’re just targets in my scope,” Peyton said. “Like tiny ants that get stepped on without a second thought. We walk around, and we kill thousands, and we don’t even blink. I was good at it. One of the best. It wasn’t hard. It was easy. It was so easy, Jericho.” His name ended with a choked sob.

Jericho curled a hand around Peyton’s head and drew him closer, cradling him.

“I was more concerned about the sand scratching my sunglasses than I was of the blood that spilled across the ground. They weren’t people, just targets. I didn’t know anything but their location and their faces.” He spread his hand over Jericho’s chest, tears thick in his tone. “Just a job. Like picking off cans on a fence.”

“We do what we have to, to protect ourselves.” Peyton’s problem wasn’t that it had been too easy; it was that he cared too much. Shutting it out, pushing away every thought that turned his targets intopeopleso that it didn’t drown him. By doing it, he’d let it destroy him from inside, a disease spreading through him unnoticed.

“They don’t drop instantly,” Peyton said dully. “It takes a few seconds for them to catch up, for the body to realise the soul is gone. Like it takes time for the message to get from the torso to the head.”

“You don’t go for a headshot?” Jericho hadn’t been taught much about long-range shooting, not the way Peyton would have been. Jericho was, for all intents and purposes, a cop. Covert black ops in some circles. He and the team were a jack-of-all-trades group that had enough skills between them to get the job done, whatever that job happened to be.

Peyton was a trained killer.

The difference might have been subtle, but it was there.

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