Slashback (Cal Leandros, #8)(68)
Goodfellow had moved to squat in front of me while Nik was in the kitchen. “Why is he like this?” he whispered fast and low. “I understand that coping with a murderer and having to kill at fifteen would be traumatizing, but this is Niko—and this is not right.”
I wrapped a careful arm around my ribs and dropped my chin on my chest, closing my eyes. Christ it hurt like a mother. “Sorry, Goodfellow, but it’s none of your business.” He was risking his life going up against Jack when he could easily walk away, knowing Jack would leave him alone. Normally that would deserve answers, but not this time.
“Cal told me about Junior and I didn’t believe him,” Niko said quietly. I jerked my head up and opened my eyes to see him standing behind Goodfellow. “I only had to do one thing: believe my brother. But I didn’t and because of that he almost died. I might as well have held the knife instead of Junior.” That wasn’t true. It wasn’t, but before I could say so, he went on, relentless. “We don’t talk about it. We never have. I was too much of a coward then to believe and too much of a coward after to relive it. To answer your question: that is why I’m like this. Twelve years of cowardice have come home to roost.”
“Nik, shut the hell up. You know that’s not right. I was a delinquent eleven-year-old kid. No one would’ve believed . . .” But it was too late. He’d already picked up his katana, turned, and disappeared down the hall into his room, shutting the door softly behind him. I would’ve preferred he slammed it. Anger was easier to deal with than blame.
“Shit.” Exhaling painfully, I avoided looking at Robin as I didn’t want to see whatever well-meaning emotion was aimed in my direction. Sometimes the smallest amount of empathy can break you if you let it. I kept my eyes fixed on the far wall and asked, “Can you get me up? I think I went from a cracked rib to a broken one when I tackled Nik.” If it was broken, and it felt that way, it was a simple break. I could breathe, somewhat, and I wasn’t coughing up blood, which meant there wasn’t a shard of bone embedded in my lung. No big deal. People walked around with a broken rib all the time—it just wasn’t much fun.
An arm looped around my back and under my free arm to help me once I got my legs under me. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked.”
I made the shrug evident in my words as I damn well wasn’t going to move my shoulders to make it. “He’s always thought it. Maybe it’s better that he said it. Keeping it inside obviously wasn’t helping, not with Jack in the picture.”
“Humans, they take things so to heart. It is one of their truest—”
I cut off Ishiah without a second thought. “Just shut up with the crap about the human heart, you *. If your kind had actually done something about their MIA angel instead of looking under a rock or two and then giving up, none of this would have happened. Jack wouldn’t have happened. Junior wouldn’t have happened and Nik wouldn’t be blaming himself for your mistake.”
Ishiah was my boss and a former warrior of Heaven, but right then that didn’t mean a thing to me. Considering all the smiting done in the Bible by his kind, I had my doubts that messing up one human’s faith in himself would mean much to him. It meant the world to me though and left me in no mood for some failed pigeon’s philosophy about man.
“I was only going to say it is one of the most noble things about them, to hold themselves accountable beyond any expectation I could have,” he finished somberly. “I’m sorry for what was done to you and Niko. I know that means nothing now, the damage is done, but I am sorry.”
Making my way to the kitchen to fish in the drawer for the bottle of codeine, I let the anger run out of me. It wasn’t Ishiah’s fault. It wasn’t Heaven’s fault if I was forced to be truthful. It was Junior’s fault and he was beyond reach. It was Jack’s fault and until we discovered how to kill him he was beyond reach too. I swallowed two pills, chased them with a glass of water and said, “I need to talk to Nik. I’ll be back in a minute.”
I made it down the hall at a speed an octogenarian with a walker would’ve mocked and knocked lightly on Nik’s door—something I’d never done. When you’ve spent nearly every day of your life together, aside from that first year Nik was at college, privacy was a nonsense word. It didn’t mean a thing. There were the puberty years, but that’s what bathroom locks were for.
I had knocked, but I didn’t wait for an invitation. That would be too far out of the ordinary and Nik needed ordinary now more than ever. He was sitting on the side of his bed oiling his katana. If positions had been reversed I’d have been under the bed sucking my thumb like an infant, but that’s why Nik was Nik. He did what no one else could and then he blamed himself for not doing the impossible.
“Hey, Cyrano.” I propped myself against his dresser to face him. I was afraid if I sat on the bed, I wouldn’t get back up . . . at least not with anything approaching grace. My ribs were the last thing Nik needed added to his plate. “Are you really going to make me be the emotionally stable one in the room? I’m not good at it. You know that.”
He raised his eyes and what I saw in them . . . Jesus, I felt like shit. He’d been the emotionally stable one our entire lives, not a single day off. My even joking about it was a crappy thing to do. “You know what? I’m a dick. You be as unstable as you need to be. If you need to kick someone’s ass to feel better, I’ll go hold Robin back so you can put the beat-down on Ishiah. He doesn’t pay me worth a damn anyway. He deserves it.”