Page 86 of Hush
“I can sleep on the couch. We don’t have to—”
“Mike.Please.” Tom’s voice pleaded with him, pulled at his heart. “I’m trying to hold it together. Please. Just…”
“Just what? Anything, Tom. Whatever you need. I’ll give it to you.”
Tom closed his eyes and held his hands up, as if he was praying. He pressed his lips to the sides of his fingers. “I am being shredded apart.” He barely spoke, practically whispered. “As a judge, my entire professional life, my career, will be in this trial. I will be on trial just as much as Desheriyev. Every word I speak, every decision I make, every moment of the trial that I direct will be dissected around the world. My history, my legal philosophy, every choice I’ve ever made. All of it, under the microscope. My obituary will start, ‘The judge who presided over the DC Sniper trial’.” His eyes opened, and he stared at Mike’s floor, at the hardwood and the throw rug he’d bought last year. “I have to pour everything I am into this. I need to be above reproach. I need to evict all the skeletons in my closet. I need to be a paragon of justice. They’re going to dig and dig anddiginto me. If they findanything, any scrap of untoward behavior, anysuggestionof scandal, my entire character will be tossed in the garbage. You haveonechance in the media. They will brand you for life if they dig something up. Andnow, with these stakes? The world may hang in the balance. The United States and Russia. God, this could lead to war.”
And here it is.Mike nodded slowly. Goodbye. The end. Life was cruel. Maybe if they survived this trial they could try again. If he played it cool. If he didn’t make Tom feel like shit. If he sacrificed his heart and put the world and the trial and everything else first, like Tom was going to have to do.
Tom kept speaking, shaking his head behind his clasped hands. “But, as aman, I finally found what I’ve been yearning for mywhole life.” His eyes flicked to Mike’s, wet and shining. “I foundyou, and everything in my life seemed to click into place. I want that, Mike. I want volleyball and Rock Creek Park, and I want to hold hands with you on the street. I want tolive. I want to beme.” He sniffed deeply, inhaling, trying to stop the trembles that settled over his body. He bowed his shoulders, and his spine stuck out of his shirt, knobs that paraded down his back. “Why does one half of me always have to be sacrificed for the other?”
Mike moved, ripping free from the freeze that had settled over him. He sat beside Tom, wrapping one arm around his waist and the other around Tom’s clasped hands. “I’m not going anywhere. I’ll be here. I’ll wait for you, through this whole thing. I support you, and I get it. I don’t like it, I hate it, and I hate that the world does this. But Igetit. And… Tom, I swear, I’m here for the long haul. Through it all. So I’ll wait for you, and this trial.”
“I don’twantto wait.” Tom turned into him, reaching for him. “I don’t want to sacrifice. I don’t want to give in,again, to the world. I don’t want to be an arm’s length away from you through this. I want you by my side. You and me—us—who we are, what we’re building? That’s not less important than this trial. It’s the other half of mylife, Mike.”
Jesus. No one had ever said Mike was worth so much to him. His throat clenched, and he blinked fast, struggling for control. “Anything you want. Anything you need,” he choked out.
“That’s one and the same:you.” Tom’s control fell at the same moment Mike’s did, and they met in the middle, a kiss stained by falling tears, salty lips pressing together over and over again. Mike held him close, cupping his face, kissing every millimeter of his lips. Tom held his wrists, thumbs stroking over his pulse. They fell back, crawling into each other’s arms as their tears mixed and merged and their kiss stretched on and on.
Mike ordered Thai for delivery and got Tom set up on his WiFi. They sat side by side in Mike’s bed, leaning against his headboard, and worked on their laptops as the TV on the wall murmured softly, tuned to CNN.
“I have to send in daily reports to Winters. Some parts are vaguer than others.”
Tom stared at him. “You’re risking a lot having me here.”
“I didn’t think you wanted me to come out and tell Winters we were dating. And there was no way I was letting Villegas run lead on this.”
“I’m being selfish, telling you we’re staying together through the trial.” Tom frowned. “I didn’t even ask what you wanted.”
“You. Safe, happy, smiling. And in my arms every night.”
Tom finally smiled, and he rested his head against Mike’s, his forehead on Mike’s temple.
The breaking news jingle burbled over Mike’s bedroom, and they both looked up at the vivid splash of color and the smear of red blazing from the flat screen. “Breaking news from Moscow,” the anchor droned. “President Dimitry Vasiliev has landed in Russia and is addressing the nation.”
It wasn’t even dawn yet in Moscow, still the bitter early hours of the morning, but Muscovites had flooded the streets, thronged around the airport and the walls of the Kremlin, waving Russian flags and chanting Vasiliev’s name. The crowd around the U.S. embassy had also steadily grown. Bricks were starting to fly at the gates, and at the Marine guards.
The camera feed cut to Russian President Dimitry Vasiliev. He stood tall, though his face was wan, skeletally pale. One arm was in a sling, and massive bandages were wrapped around his shoulder and down to his elbow. He had on a button-down, but clearly, one arm had been cut away, the edges tucked into the bandages encasing his right shoulder and slung arm. Dark circles smudged the deep canyons beneath his eyes.
“My friends!” President Vasiliev cried in Russian. A translator spoke over his rumbling voice. “I am so glad to return to my homeland in one piece. To land here and see all your smiling faces is the best gift that a president can ever receive.” He stopped, taking in a slow breath. Vasiliev was pulling a Reagan, making a speech to his people to soothe their nerves, even though he was barely able to stand. “The American devils, those demons of the West, tried their best to strike me down. But their dogs were not strong enough to touch Russia’s beating heart.”
Cheers rose, wails and bellows from the crowd around Vasiliev, speaking from a hastily-erected podium at the base of his presidential jet.
“It wasn’t an American who shot him,” Tom murmured. “Does he not know that we have the shooter? And that he’s Russian?”
“Chechen.”
“Still. This looks like an internal dog fight, not an American one.”
Vasiliev continued speaking, drowning out whatever Mike was going to say in response. “The Americans think they can be rid of Russia so easily! That they can strike me down on the steps of their Capitol! That they can destroy the heart of Russia, cut off the head of her mighty dragon! Their arrogance knows no bounds!”
More roars. More thunderous shouts.
“For years, they have tried to attack us, provoke us into defending ourselves. For years they have tried to destroy us, turn the world against us. Well, I say this. America, and President McDonough, you have crossed the line. Your actions have roused the great Russian dragon, and we will defend ourselves! The whole world watched your cowardly acts, your failures that lead to the deaths of a great Russian man, my security agent. The whole world watched as you tried—and failed—to assassinate me.”
Mike whistled.
“The whole world is watching, President McDonough. The whole world is watching your next moves. Your unchecked aggression against Russia will not go unanswered! And, my friends, I make you this promise tonight.” Vasiliev took another shaky breath, pausing as he stared over the crowd, and then into the lens of the camera. “Russia will not accept silence and American excuses. We will demand answers. We will demand justice. Even if we must seek that justice ourselves.”
