“It is to me.” His voice is quiet when he says it, which is somehow more difficult to deal with than if he’d snapped. “You’re back in command, you’re carrying Niko’s stuff here, you’re doing all of this, and now you’re trying to take this on as well.”
“Yes,” I say. “Because you being visible is a problem and we both know it.” His lips press into a thin line. “We agreed, remember? We need to be careful,” I add.
That makes him pause. I’m right, he knows I am, and I can see how much he hates it. The silence stretches for a few seconds. “I don’t like this.”
“I know.”
He swallows. “But fine. I’ll dial it back,” he says. “Be around less.”
“No, not at all. I’ll handle it,” I tell him.
His mouth parts to object, because of course he does, it’s Caiden. “You shouldn’t have to fucking—”
“No, but I will,” I say, cutting across what he was about to say before he can finish. He looks at me briefly, as if he’s trying to find a way around this that doesn’t involve either of us losing something.
“All right,” he says finally. “But if Niko starts slipping—”
“I’ll know, and I’ll fix it.” That much, at least, is true.
That evening I go into town for groceries, then stop over at Niko’s flat. He opens the door on the second knock, looking slightly better than the last time I saw him, which isn’t the same as good.
I move around the room without speaking much. Tidying things up, putting the groceries away, putting food in front of him and ordering him to eat it. Eventually, Niko sits down. “You shouldn’t be the one doing this,” he says.
“No one else is here.”
He lets out a tired breath. “Caiden is.”
That makes me stop with a bottle still in my hand. “I know,” I say.
“I don’t know what I would’ve done without him,” he says, now looking at me. That makes me pause, not because I don’t already know Caiden is that sort of man,but because hearing it out loud in here, from Niko, makes the whole thing feel more... I don't even know, if I'm honest. But I do know that I feel guilty. Guilty because I wasn’t here and he was, and because I told him to stay away. Guilty because I didn’t help enough before Cassie... left. I turn back to the sink before my face has a chance to do anything unhelpful. “He’s a good man,” Niko says after a moment.
“I know.”
“I’m going to sleep before Vladimir wakes up again,” he says eventually, after finishing his food. “You can let yourself out?”
I nod. “I’ll come tomorrow.”
He disappears down the hall without another word. For a minute, I stay where I am in the kitchen, my hands on the edge of the sink, listening to the sounds in the flat around me. The baby makes a small noise in his sleep and then goes quiet again. I go and stand by the cot, one hand resting on the edge, not touching him, just checking on him. Then I step back, pull my gloves on, and leave.
By the time I reach my room, the ache has sunk into the usual places — behind my eyes, across my shoulders, somewhere low in the spine.
I hang my coat up and sit on the edge of the bed without taking my boots off. The quiet in the room is absolute, and in that quiet, just once — because there’s no one here to hear it — I admit the truth.
I’m tired.
Not exercise or bad sleep tired. Tired at the core of me. I’m tired of pretending that I can hold everything together.
And the worst part of all, I’m tired of watching Caiden understand and accept things that still hurt him.
Eventually I lay back and shut my eyes, but rest never really comes. My brain keeps moving anyway, circling the same thoughts over and over until the dark outside the window startsturning grey.
TWENTY-NINE
CAIDEN
Anger is easier than grief. It’s easier than helplessness, watching a system close ranks, and pretend it hasn’t just swallowed another person whole. At least, with anger, you can hold on to it with both hands, point it somewhere or even use it to get through the day without folding in half in front of people.
I don’t do a brilliant job of hiding it, and the worst part is I don’t give a fuck.
