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Brandon crossed to me quickly to grab the gun, then released the magazine, and checked the chamber.
"Jesus Christ, it's loaded!" I practically detonated when I saw him push the magazine back into place.
He just frowned. "Um, no. It's not loaded unless I actually chamber a round."
I just stared at him like he was speaking a foreign language. "But there are bullets. Inside it."
Brandon smirked. "It wouldn't really serve its purpose without them, Red."
At the sound of my nickname, something inside me snapped. Humor? Now?
"This is not the time for jokes," I said. "You have a gun in your tie drawer. A gun filled with bullets that could actually kill people. What happened to 'using the weapons you have'?" I blinked as a thought occurred to me. "Have you always had a gun in your house?"
Brandon shrugged, but had the decency to look uneasy. "Not for a long time. But now seemed like a good time to pick up the skill again. What? It's perfectly legal. I have a license."
"Pick up the skill?" I stared at the loaded pistol as I sat on the bed. "This isn't a hobby. Guns are not bicycles or knitting."
I grabbed a throw blanket and pulled it over my mostly-naked body. I couldn't have said what color it was. I couldn't register anything about my new bedroom. Suddenly I felt very cold.
"Red."
Brandon sat down next to me and put an arm around my shoulder, but I shrugged it off. Then suddenly, I had to move. I couldn't be in the same space as him and think. I stood up, and with the blanket flying behind me like a cape, I paced about the large bedroom.
"This––what––I––" I sputtered, stumbling over my words, as I couldn't even decide exactly what I wanted to say. I stared at Brandon, who finally looked genuinely worried.
"Why?" I asked.
His brows furrowed, and he looked down at the weapon cradled in his hands. "Why not?"
I balked. "Why not?"
Brandon swallowed, and then shrugged. "Okay, fine. I just mean, what have we been talking about tonight? I want to be able to protect us. Protect you, of course." He looked up at me again, his blue eyes scared and angry all at once. "Skylar, what happened to you...fuck. That was my fault."
"It was not your fault," I said immediately. "That's ridiculous, and you know it."
"It was my fault," he argued. "I brought that guy down on you and your family because of who I am, and I didn't anticipate it. You even said so. I brought all of them onto you."
I looked at the gun again, then back at him. "This wouldn't have stopped Messina. You have to know that." Then a thought occurred to me. "Brandon, do you carry this around with you?"
He opened his mouth, then closed it again. "I––no. Lucas said that was a really bad idea, and Cory said if I was every photographed with it, it would be the end of the campaign. Done. Boston is really not the kind of place where being pro-gun goes over well."
I rubbed my lips together, considering. "Are you pro-gun? That's not what your platform says."
Brandon sighed again, turning the gun over in his hands. "I'm pro-control; that's not a lie. But that doesn't mean I think people shouldn't be able to own them." He looked up at me, full of determination. "A man should be able to protect what's his, Skylar. Like I said, with the weapons I have."
I cocked an eyebrow and stood up. "Okay, Daniel Boone."
Brandon rolled his eyes. "Seriously."
"Okay, seriously."
I paced back and forth across the room a few times, but in the end, there was only one thing I could say. "You're not doing this to protect us. You're doing it for peace of mind."
Brandon tossed a hand into the air. "Is there a difference?"
"I think so. Just because a gun is in the house doesn't mean you would be able to keep me safe in the event something awful happens. Craig's team is better equipped to deal with that, and you know it."
He made no reply, just kept holding the gun. The way he handled it, with such obvious ease and familiarity, made me nervous. At some point in his life, Brandon had used a gun like this before. A lot. He hadn't killed anyone––I believed him when he told me that––but that didn't take away from the fact that his adolescence and early adult years were filled with violence, from inside and outside his home. Self-protection was a premium he clearly still had a hard time entrusting to others.
