Closer (20 page)

Steve had decided to intervene about the same time Rob stopped pummeling Michael. Steve helped an exhausted and deflated Rob to his feet. Then he went to Michael’s feet and reached out his hand. It turned out Rob had beat the crap out of Michael and he required Steve to lift him from under his armpits to stand. Once upright, Michael started to stagger disoriented into traffic. Steve caught him and directed him to the backseat of the car. He had left Rob sitting on the hood. Once Michael was secure and passed out in the back, Steve walked back to the front and stood in front of Rob. Rob reached out to Steve and pulled him into an intimate embrace. They were brothers; they hugged like brothers for as long as Rob needed. Rob was the one to break away wiping tears from his eyes. He had just beaten the shit out of his best friend, and he knew, beyond a doubt, that that tough son-of-a-bitch let him. Rob was truly humbled.

They returned to the car and continued their drive, in silence, to Rob’s house. They reached Rob’s house without further incident, only stopping to use the bathroom. Steve checked on Michael occasionally, making sure he was still breathing. He probably needed a hospital, but Rob promised to fix him up when they reached the house. Michael was passed out until about thirty minutes outside of Lewiston when he regained consciousness and tried desperately to sit up.

“Michael,” Rob exhaled, clearly worried about his best friend. “Look. I know what you did back there for me, and I appreciate it. More than you will ever know,” Rob said humbly to a battered, bloodied, and bruised face, although it was hard to see the damage through all of the blood that caked Michael’s face.

“Do you feel any better?” Michael coughed mid-sentence from the blood which coated his throat. “No. Now I feel worse for what I did to you,” Rob apologized trying to make eye contact through the tiny slits that served as Michael’s eyes.

“You didn’t do anything to me I wasn’t willing to let you do. You know me. If I wanted to stop it, I would have,” Michael reassured his friend. “I knew it was coming and decided to meet it head on,” he said trying to catch Rob’s tear-filled eyes through his slits. “Do you remember why we decided to save Emma? This is important to me, man. You have to remember the logical reasons behind why we did what we did. You are my closet friend. I can’t lose you, man.” Michael implored through his swollen lips.

“I remember. I remember everything. I don’t blame you or Emma, Michael,” Rob professed.
Thank God
. Emma didn’t need Rob’s anger directed at her during her recovery period. The thought of Emma was what gave Michael the strength to endure his beating.

“I know where the blame lies, and by my calculations we killed three of the five of them,” Rob said to Michael.

“Yes, we did, brother!” Michael attempted to smile through the pain, “and the other two will serve out the remainder of their days in prison cells.”

“So, how are you really?” Michael asked Rob.

“Truthfully, I don’t know. It hasn’t sunk in yet. I do feel awful about what I did to you.”

“Ah!” said Michael. “Remember, I let you do it.”

“If you say so,” Rob bantered with his friend.

It was good that Rob started to return to himself. He had a long, painful road ahead, but this beating freed some of his more base emotions. Rob continued to silently sob the remainder of the ride home. These men had seen him scared, seen him brave, and now they had seen him broken. These men knew him inside and out. He trusted them with his soul, which is why he allowed himself to cry in front of them.
Or so he told himself
.

By the time they arrived, the sun was beginning to set. They got out of the car and staggered their way down the front walk as the sun dropped below the horizon.

Emma lay awake upstairs in her bed thinking about the last time she was with Michael. She longed to feel his lips on her skin. She ached to feel him deep inside her. Would he come back to her? Once the terrorist threat was taken care of, would he still want her with the same ferocity that he wanted her with before?

After an hour of trying to get comfortable, she gave up and figured a hot shower was in order. She needed to clean out her flesh wound, and the hot water would wash away her stress. She spent a good, long twenty minutes in the shower letting the warmth wash over her body. She took great care to wash the wound with soap. It still burned when anything touched it, but it felt a hundred times better than when it first happened over two days ago. Her movements were still limited, but now she could move. She could walk around the house and had even cooked dinner for Tony that night.

With the hot water spraying her naked body, she once again thought of Michael. She prayed on more than two occasions, that he come back to her in one piece. She knew how dangerous these terrorists could be, stopping at nothing to reach their desired end. One had shot her. They were ruthless. And the torture Michael had to put Ahmed through before he gave up the information just went to prove how dedicated they were to achieving that end. She prayed Michael was all right. She prayed no one got hurt. She prayed Michael still wanted her the same way she still wanted him. If anything, after he’d gone on such a dangerous mission, she wanted him all the more. Flesh wound be damned, she would have him when he returned home to her. Funny, this wasn’t her home, yet she thought of it as such because this is where Michael would be returning.

She turned off the water and stepped onto the floor mat in the guest bathroom. She dried herself off and slowly dressed in her shorts and a tank top, standard issue sleeping attire when she was alone. Sure, she owned a negligee or two, but had yet to wear one for Michael. She couldn’t wait to get Michael back to her house so she could try one on for him. How would he react to seeing her dressed in a scandalous see-through lace material and a thong pair of panties? She hoped he would rip the clothes from her body. She liked it when he was rough with her. She remembered him ripping the panties from her body the first night they were together and then smelling them. His reaction had been so primal, so base. There was an extreme amount of power in knowing she did that to him. She drove him to his base urges.

As she was dressing, she heard a car door slam and then another. She finished putting on her top and then raced to the front window. The sight took her breath away. There were three men walking slowly down the front walk towards the door. Michael was following Steve and Rob, so she couldn’t get a good look at Michael.

“Where’s Lizzie,” she thought as she raced down the hallway to the stairs.

She reached the bottom step, the same time the men entered the door. Her breath caught in her throat and tears immediately fell from her eyes. She looked at a battered Michael and ran to him, throwing her arms around his neck and pulling him to her body. Thoughts of Lizzie fled her mind as they were replaced with thoughts of Michael.

“What happened,” she asked lightly touching Michael’s swollen lips. Michael winced, still sore from his beating. He shook his head indicating he didn’t want to talk about it.

“Not now. I’ll tell you later,” Michael said making eye contact with Rob before Rob bowed his head. She would have to wait for an explanation on Michael’s condition. She didn’t want to push, not right now. She looked to Rob.

“Where’s Lizzie,” she innocently asked Rob. Rob had just gained his composure; he didn’t want to lose it again, not in front of Emma.

“We were too late,” Rob whispered, bowing his head careful to avoid Emma’s eyes. If he saw sympathy there, he would lose it all over again.

Emma let go of Michael and stepped away. She found the couch and sat down waiting for an explanation. She looked up from her hands as Tony entered the room. He sat down next to her. “So, fill us in,” Tony said to Rob and Steve.

Michael joined Emma on the couch and tucked her safely under his arm. He had missed her something fierce. He just needed to touch her, even just her shoulder to reassure himself that he had made all of the right decisions. He needed to breathe and touching her allowed him to do that. Once she was safely in his arms, he met her gaze. His eyes misted up but not from the pain. Tears started to fall at the thought they had traded Emma’s life for Lizzie’s. Guilt was a bitch, and he was feeling it right now. He pressed his forehead against hers and lingered there while Steve started to speak.

Steve told Tony and Emma everything they had been through to stop the terrorist cell. He told of finding Lizzie’s lifeless body tied to the bed. He spoke of the condition in which they found her. Emma clutched Michael closer. She couldn’t believe they were too late. They were so confident they would get to her in time. Rob had just heard her the day before. What could have happened to her that killed her that quickly. She had read of older couples losing a spouse; once that happened, it wasn’t long until the spouse who remained died of a broken heart. Was Lizzie’s heartbroken from what they did to her? Did they kill her? Did they starve her to death? Did she die of dehydration? “How did she die?” She asked looking up to Michael for the answer.

“We won’t know until they finish with the autopsy,” Michael replied.

Rob couldn’t take anymore; he had to leave the room. He made his way to his bedroom and dove face first onto the bed he had shared with his Lizzie.

He gathered her pillow close and inhaled her scent. It smelled like Lizzie, uniquely her own scent. He sobbed into her pillow holding it close to his face. His pleas for release from the pain were so strong, no noise escaped his throat. He took her scent for granted every single day, and now he would never smell her again. He bartered with God to allow him to hold Lizzie one more time. Just one more time, and then he would accept that she was dead. He could let her go if he got to hold her one more time.

He eventually cried himself to sleep.

Downstairs with Michael seated at the kitchen table, Emma kneeled in front of him much the same way he had once kneeled in front of her. She gently dabbed the dried blood from Michael’s face with a warm wash cloth.

“Are you going to tell me how this happened?” she asked, agitated at how Michael was once again keeping her in the dark about himself. He didn’t like to talk about himself that much was clear, but she needed to know what had happened. Had a terrorist got a hold of him?

“You won’t like the answer, and I don’t want you thinking less of him,” Michael responded meeting Emma’s determined crystal blue eyes. “He is my best friend.”

“What? Rob did this to you? Why?” She asked, furious that Rob would lay a hand on him.

“You don’t understand, Emma,” Michael said stoking her face with the back side of his fingers trying to ease her mental state.

“Try me. I’m real good at understanding.”

“He blamed you and me for what happened to Lizzie. He wanted an outlet for his anguish. I was there. He didn’t do anything to me I didn’t let happen.”

Her misty eyes met his. “Why does he think that? I stole all of the information from my employer to save Lizzie. Why would he think we were to blame for Lizzie’s death?” she rambled.

“Because we saved you first,” Michael exhaled the secret hoping Emma would not start blaming herself. He was doing enough of that for the both of them.

Tears streamed down her face. She felt for Rob, but she couldn’t bring herself to understand how he could hurt his best friend. “So, you look like this because of me,” she muttered. He met her gaze with determination.

“It is not because of you. Do not think, for one second, we would have done anything differently. We had to save you. I could never let anything happen to you. The way I feel about you, Emma, doesn’t make sense, but I feel it nonetheless.”

“But Lizzie died because you were saving me,” she cried, lowering her head into Michael’s lap. She left her head there, turned to the side, torturing Michael with her tears.

Michael cradled her head and stroked her hair. “No, Lizzie died because of what the terrorists did to her. It wasn’t because of you. You were only trying to help her, just like I was. But what Rob is going through, Rob just needed to take out the pain he was feeling on someone. I was there. I’m his best friend. I understand how he works, so I let myself be his punching bag. I will heal. I will heal a lot sooner than he will. He will feel the loss of Lizzie for a long time to come. Look at me,” he said grabbing her chin and forcing her cloudy blue eyes to his. “You are not to blame for Lizzie’s death; I won’t have it. There was nothing we could have done to save her. God knows we tried. We just got there too late.”

“Yeah, because you were too busy saving me. I will never forgive myself, Michael. Never.”

Michael felt lost. What could he do to convince her it wasn’t her fault? Although he felt guilty himself, he would never blame her.

He rationalized out loud for both their sakes. “Look. I would never have met you if it wasn’t for the terrorists threatening Rob with Lizzie’s life. I would never have come to your home and tried to kidnap you. We would never have had to steal the documents and prototype if the terrorists didn’t threaten Rob with Lizzie’s life. We wouldn’t have had to save you, if the terrorists didn’t try to cut Rob and Lizzie out of the picture by kidnapping you. This all leads back to the terrorists. I need you to see that,” he declared.

She parted his knees by leaning into him. She needed to feel he didn’t blame her. It was bad enough she blamed herself. She leaned in and pressed her lips softly to Michael’s. Michael pressed his tongue against her lips asking for entrance. She parted her lips, and he gently stroked at her bottom lip with his tongue. She tasted his guilt and his pain. She felt the depths of his feelings for her, and she tried to communicate the same. Their tender kiss lasted until Tony entered the room excusing himself with a cough.

Emma and Michael looked at him with a look of contentment in their eyes and tear tracks staining their faces.

“Are you hungry?” Tony asked not waiting for an answer. “Steve is. I can make something. Breakfast ingredients are all Rob has left,” Tony said. Michael was starving. He couldn’t remember the last time he ate.