Page 79 of Meet Me In The Dark

Micah snorted. “Look at you, lying now. You may have wanted me safe, and I love you for that, but you knew that I’d come after you. Don’t pretend for a second you didn’t. Bullshitting yourself doesn’t suit you, Boy Scout.”

Okay, that was fair.

“Fine,” Luke conceded. “But you didn’t have to bring her, you could have left her with Marcus.”

Even in the dim light, Luke could see Micah roll his eyes. “Two for two, Luke. You really think Kara would let herself be left behind? That she wouldn’t fight her way to be here? She literally sweet-talked Billy into bringing her tome. And do you truly think she would have been safe with Marcus?”

“Safer than here,” Luke shot back.

Micah processed this, then nodded. “Okay, let’s say you’re right. Would that have been fair? To abandon her, knowing we probably wouldn’t have made it back? She’s part of our family. Our team. She’s one of us. She doesn’t deserve to be put in a glass box and kept safe. She deserves to live her life the way she wants. To fight for us. With us. Why do you think she’s so livid with Conor right now? Don’t fall for the trap Christopher laid out for us. It does us no good.”

Before Luke could respond, Micah added, “Are you really angry at me, Luke?”

Trust Micah to get to the heart of the matter. Luke was having a hard time holding onto his anger at him.

“No,” Luke admitted. “But I feel helpless as fuck, and I hate that feeling more.”

“You’re scared,” Micah said.

Fuck, he was.

And he hated it.

The last time he’d been scared was when Kara had been taken, and they didn’t know how to find her. Luke had been left behind that time, recovering from his injury, and lying in a bed at Marcus’ goddamned mountain castle, alone, he’d felt angry and scared and…helpless.

Yeah.

“Terrified,” Luke admitted. “I’m fucking terrified, and I don’t know what to do about it.”

His terror wasn’t over dying. No, it was having to watch his loved ones die that scared him. Somehow, he’d been able to deal with that fear when they’d been SEALs, had known how to compartmentalize the feeling so it didn’timpact their missions. But back then, he’d never admitted his love to Micah and Conor. Not to them, not to himself. When they brought Kara back, she’d catalyzed an entire emotional journey that led to him here, unable to shove his love and fear and helplessness back in a box where it couldn’t hurt him.

“I am, too,” Micah admitted. “I’m trying to see a way out of this, but I’m failing. I thought I’d come up with something by now. I’ve even been doing what I can with my…usual skills,” he said, only alluding to his manipulation tactics because of the mics. “But it requires more time than we may have. Fuck, I even prayed, and you know I haven’t done that in a long ass fucking time. I don’t know what to fucking do. Except try to love each other in the time we have left.”

Luke digested this. “I love you,” he said, his voice gentle. “In case I haven’t told you that before.”

Micah smiled sadly. “I know you do, baby. But it’s good to hear you say it, anyway. I love you, too, more than I ever thought possible. For what it’s worth, I wish you weren’t here, either.”

God, that was it, wasn’t it? They all wanted to face their deaths alone, but?—

“We’re a team,” Luke said. “Leave no man behind, and all that shit.”

Micah’s voice was more serious than he’d ever heard it. “I’d never leave you behind, Luke. Never leave you. Ever.”

This time it was Luke’s turn to say, “I know. Tell you what; this whole fucking mess has killed my abandonment issues.” Then he grimaced. “Bad choice of words.”

Micah chuckled. “I’m glad they’re gone, bro.”

“Me too.”

Luke wished, desperately, that he wasn’t chained to theopposite wall from Micah. That his hands were free, so he could touch his lover, kiss him, caress him, make love to him.

As if Micah heard his thought, he said, “I wish I could touch you. Wish I could hold you. Wish I could wrap my mouth around your cock and?—”

Ah, fuck.Luke interrupted him. “Please don’t make me hard, when there’s nothing I can do about it.”

But Micah wasn’t going to be deterred. “I miss you inside of me, baby. And I promise, if we get out of here, I’ll let you beat my ass for bringing Kara. Just because I love you.”

Luke’s cock thickened at Micah’s words, and the image they created. And he wanted that, so badly, not even because he wanted to fuck. No, because he missed being close to his lovers in that way, connecting with them through touch and taste, rough or gentle, fast or slow.

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