Page 25 of Unmistakably Us

Eight

Regret flooded Logan’s bloodstream as he had pulled from the gravel lot earlier. It wasn’t the words he had said that caused his reflection, but January’s reaction to them. The color had drained from her face, and he’d thought she might pass out. After that, the ride had been fairly silent and their parting kiss strained.

He watched January drive away before turning toward the hangar. “Fuck,” he grated out loud. Inside him, emotions were warring. Not just a small offensive either. It was an all-out world war. No matter how much he stroked the stone in his pocket, he couldn’t find that inner calm he sought.

Logan was still in disbelief that he’d let the words pass his lips, but even more so at her look of horror. There was obviously something he was missing or he was just plain oblivious. January had seemed like the hearts and flowers type to him, always had. She had a dirty side, but she was also your typical good girl. She wanted to be loved and have a steady man in her life, maybe even a yappy purse dog.

“How could I have been so wrong?” he muttered to himself as he ran into another person.

“Omph.” The wind was knocked out of him.

“Whoa, wrong about what?” Looking up into the eyes of the speaker, he discovered John and Michael had beat him to work.

“Uh, nothing. Just in my own head a bit.”

John clapped him on the back and led him to the table where his brother sat, sipping coffee and reading the paper. Who reads the paper anymore?

Throwing his leg over the chair, he answered John’s silent inquiry with an affirmative nod. John responded with a steaming cup of joe and sat at the table, too. It was a regular…regular thing.

Silence drew on to the point where Logan almost started singing just to cut through it.

Silence had never been Logan’s friend; he would go as far as to call it his enemy. When it was quiet, the voices in his head…his sperm donor, uncle…his voice, screamed at him. Their hurtled insults and bullshit assaulted him in the silence.

Logan loathed the absence of sound. The only time it didn’t seem to attack him was when January was there. It was like her very presence resonated on a sound wave and drowned out all the negativity in his heart and head.

The desire to scream into the hangar and hear it echo off the walls was almost overwhelming and being overwhelmed was not where he needed to be right now. When feeling that sense of microscopic outward existence, was when he spilled his secrets.

He was a cunt hair away from opening his mouth and telling Michael everything when John finally spoke.

“So, what is it you were so wrong about?” John asked casually before he sipped from his snarky mug. Logan figured he must have swiped someone else’s since John wasn’t loaded in the snark game.

For the second time, Logan thought to deny it was anything, but his fuck it meter pegged out at one hundred and he decided to tell the truth. Partial as it may be and without the colorful language that would get his ass handed to him.

“January and I have been kind of—”

“Fucking?” Michael supplied with an asshole grin and a ravenous bite to his bear claw.

“Michael.” John growled a warning to his friend. “Go ahead Logan, but mind the descriptions, for my sake, please?”

“I didn’t plan to put it like that, but yes we’ve been…seeing each other.” Logan stalled, searching for the correct words to convey exactly what he wanted and nothing more. Just because he was about to step outside his comfort zone and—gulp—share, didn’t mean he was about to tell his life story and bond over a shitty cup of coffee in a chipped mug.

Apparently, John wasn’t a fan of silence either or he just wanted me to get on with it. That was more likely. “Yes, we know you’ve been seeing each other. So, what you were wrong about is her?” John’s visage darkened, and he looked like he could chew nails. Logan was at a loss. He had thought John semi-approved, but maybe he was wrong.

John stood and walked over to the coffee machine, his gait aggressive and his body tense. What the fuck? He turned and his eyes held murderous intent. His voice shook with rage as he spoke. “So, we treat you like family and you sleep with my wife’s little sister and plan to dump her now that you’ve gotten what you want, and you have the balls to walk in here this morning like I’d be okay with that?” John spun, tossing the coffee into the sink followed directly by the mug. The sound of it shattering echoed through the hangar.

Logan was so stunned, it took him a few seconds for John’s words and actions to register. Logan did the mental math and added it all up. “Oh, shit, no man. No!” Logan leapt to his feet, raising his hands in surrender, and if he were honest, in an attempt to hold John back in case he charged.

Stunned stupid. That’s the only way to describe Logan’s status as Michael leapt to his feet and directly in front of Logan. Protectively?Well, shit. “John, back down. Give him a chance to explain.”

I’ll be a monkey’s fucking uncle. Michael is siding with me…over John. And he is doing it blindly.Something shifted in Logan, something he couldn’t comprehend, but he knew it was huge.

“Why should I? You heard him. Why are you defending him?” John was not normally hot-headed and angry. To hear everyone else speak about John, he was control personified. Logan damn sure had never seen him like this.

“Because, he’s my brother, your brother. He deserves the benefit of the doubt or at the very least, a chance to say something stupid and run. It’s what we do for everyone, and Logan is one of us.”

Fuck.Logan clutched his chest, at the pain of being reborn or maybe he was having an infarction; he wasn’t sure which, but they were labeling him a Reid, just as much as any of them. He was a part of a family, and his brother was the one to say it.

Michael turned his head to the side and stage-whispered over his shoulder. “You better make it good, because I have never seen this side of him and frankly, I’m fucking pissing in my boxers over here.” John shook with rage.

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