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“You’re sorry?” He jumps to his feet, balls his fist up and punches the air. “YOU ARE SORRY? Fuck, Micah, I’M THE ONE WHO’S SORRY!”
I’m stunned into silence. Conner doesn’t really go off like this.
He falls back down on the deck and turns his head. There’s so much grief in his face that I don’t know how to react.
“I left you.” His voice is thick with heartbreak. “I fucking left you while Tessie begged me not to. She cried, Micah. She even hit me. All she wanted was to get back to you. But I left you anyway. Right now you’d either be dead or missing both your hands if Gage hadn’t been there. You were getting cut to pieces while I was running away like a coward.”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
“I left you,” he repeats and spreads his arms wide, a beseeching gesture. “You’re a brother to me and I left you. I can’t fix this, can’t make it right.”
“Conner.” I grab his shirt.
He flinches away.
“Conner, fucking look at me. You did what I told you to do, what Iwantedyou to do. There was nothing more important than getting Tess out of there. You know what they were planning to do to her. Tessie is safe becauseyou kept her safe. I owe you everything for that and don’t you dare regret it.”
He’s still miserable, lost in the agony of that night, and he lets out a low moan. “I looked everywhere, Micah. I swear I did. I would have given anything to find it for you.”
Goddammit, he’s talking about my hand.
“It’s gone, Conner. You did everything you could.”
He shuts his eyes and lowers his head.
I grab the back of his neck. “Listen to what I said. Let it sink in.”
But he shoves me off again.
“Conner!”
He spins and throws me another wounded look.
The years melt away for a second and it feels like we’re boys again.
One summer day Conner was trying to keep up with my daredevil shit while we were climbing a gnarled mesquite tree. Gage shouted from the ground that the branches were dead and wouldn’t hold our weight. Gage usually knew what he was talking about but I didn’t listen so Conner didn’t listen. He kept climbing higher. A branch did break and the fall knocked him unconscious for a while. Conner woke up but that fall had cost him a hell of a lot. Memories, skills, knowledge. He was held back a grade while a team of tutors tried to get him caught up. Before the fall, Conner was an outstanding student. After the fall, he always had trouble with school.
And always, at the back of my mind, was the tortured thought that his fall was my fault. If I hadn’t been climbing so high, always dancing a dangerous edge to prove how fucking brave I am, then he wouldn’t have followed.
“Conner, please listen.”
His eyes are red and tormented but he’s listening.
“You saved Tess. I meant it when I said I’m grateful. I know what it took for you to follow those orders. I’m not sure I would have had the courage to do the same. Don’t be sorry. And stop beating yourself up. Can’t deny that I sure do wish I had my hand back, but if this was the price I had to pay to keep her safe then it’s worth it. Do you hear me?”
He looks at my arm, blows out a thick breath. Then he nods. “Yeah.”
“Good.”
He arches a brow. “You’re not really moving out, are you? I mean, I get it if you guys want to get your own place, but I don’t want you to go. You’re my family. This really only became a home when you both got here.”
I sling my good arm over his shoulder. “We’ll always be family.”
“So you’re naming the baby after me, right?”
“That’s the wiseass Wiseman I know.” I grip him in a headlock.
He snorts and breaks free.
