Out of the Ashes: A Metahuman Files: Classified Novella Read online

  Cillian’s assault hadn’t been sexual in nature, though that underlying threat had been present. The degree of violence didn’t matter, according to Dr. O’Malley. They’d still had their choices, their bodily autonomy, ripped away. So it was no wonder sex wasn’t something Sean could easily dive back into when he didn’t believe he had the right to touch Alexei in such a way after being the cause of his pain.

  “Senya?”

  Sean blinked, refocusing on Alexei and the faint frown marring his face. “Yes?”

  Alexei eyed him hopefully. “Is good news, da?”

  Sean bit the inside of his cheek, wishing he felt as happy about the change in his status as Alexei did. “Sure, but I’ll feel better about it when you pass yours tomorrow.”

  Alexei waved off his concern. “Will pass. Not worry.”

  Not for the first time did Sean wish he had Alexei’s unwavering confidence. Strike Force seemed to lend a certain steely mindset to its operatives that never faded, no matter how many years out of Special Forces a person got. Sean’s career as a CIA officer before becoming an MDF agent had been marked with long missions on his own in deep cover. That bred its own form of confidence, but nowhere close to Alexei’s steadiness.

  There were moments, few and far between, where Sean resented Alexei’s ability to move on faster than he was from that fixed moment in time where agony had colored everything. He’d confessed that only once, at the tail end of a three-hour session with Dr. O’Malley that had ended with him puking into her office garbage can once the words left his mouth. She hadn’t judged him for his words or his state of mind at the time, even if Sean did.

  Recovery, as the good doctor liked to say, was never easy and never linear.

  “Do you know who your undercover field test is with?” Sean asked.

  “Not sure. Think maybe Agent Carmichael.”

  Sean fought back a grimace. “Oh.”

  Agent Melanie Carmichael was a supervisory agent who was very good at her job even if she had clear favorites. Sean was not one of them. When he’d come onboard the MDF several years ago, she’d been one of the intelligence division’s rising stars. Human, but with a killer track record, Carmichael hadn’t appreciated Sean joining up for whatever reason he still couldn’t figure out. The few interactions they’d had were cold, if cordial, and Sean had given up forging a decent working relationship with her. Luckily, as a metahuman he wasn’t in her direct chain of command, but he worried she would view Alexei through the same negative filter she viewed him.

  Alexei didn’t seem to notice his unease. Most of his attention was on attacking the vareniki dough with the rolling pin his mother, Maria Dvorkin, had given him for his 31st birthday earlier that month. His tongue poked out the corner of his mouth, a hint of pink Sean was drawn to regardless of the stalemate between them when it came to physical intimacy.

  Since moving into the apartment, Alexei had been trying his hand at cooking more and more, attempting to recreate the food of his teenage years after arriving in America. They had the time—so much time, really—in between therapy sessions and needed to fill it with something. The other members of Alpha Team came by when they could, but the team was still on active duty and going on missions. While Sean caught up on mindless television, Alexei spent time in the kitchen, and Maria had seen fit to outfit them with some of the simpler, but no less important, items a home cook would need.

  Alexei was a pretty decent cook when he followed the recipe, but over a decade of eating field rations and mess hall chow hadn’t gifted him with the culinary skills of a trained chef. Sean still appreciated his attempts though, especially when he went to the trouble of making a favorite dish.

  “What time do you have to report in tomorrow?” Sean asked.

  “Early. Kilyusha pick me up.”

  Alexei sounded apologetic, and while Sean felt a little stung at not being asked first, he couldn’t be mad if Alexei wanted to spend time with his brother. Sean slid off the stool after a moment and paused, torn between his desire to be somewhere else and wanting to wipe that stray smudge of flour off Alexei’s face. His indecision lasted too long, and Alexei looked up, raising an eyebrow in a questioning manner.

  “You have,” Sean gestured at his own face, “some flour. Right there.”

  He mentally kicked himself for not going over to Alexei and doing what he wanted to do, resigned to watching Alexei wipe the flour off using the back of his hand.

  “Messy,” Alexei said with a shrug. “Will clean up later.”

  Before, Alexei would’ve maybe leered at him, said something suggestive in a way that would make Sean roll his eyes but still agree to whatever dirty thought Alexei had. Now, nothing followed, and Sean didn’t realize he was holding his breath waiting for it until his lungs started to hurt.

  Turning his back on the kitchen, Sean headed for their bedroom, intent on getting out of his suit and changing into more comfortable clothes. If doing so got him out of earshot so Alexei couldn’t hear him swear quietly in frustration, well then that was fine. Sean’s issues weren’t Alexei’s problem outside their joint therapy sessions.

  “You’re a shitty liar,” Sean told his reflection in the bathroom mirror.

  Maybe that was true, but some days the lies he told himself were the only things keeping him standing on his own two feet.

  2

  Washington, D.C.

  USA

  “> Kyle said in Russian as he passed over a travel cup containing what smelled like actual coffee.

  Alexei quickly closed the car door and snagged the cup, taking a huge gulp. It was definitely coffee, and he sighed happily. “>”

  “>”

  Alexei buckled up as Kyle pulled away from the curb and into the early-morning street traffic. Dawn was a couple of hours away and the sky was pitch-black beyond the hazy brightness of light pollution in the Washington, D.C. megacity.

  “>” Alexei muttered against the rim of the travel cup. “>”

  “>”

  “>”

  Kyle snorted. “>”

  “>” Kyle didn’t have an immediate retort to that, which made Alexei smirk. “>”

  “>”

  “>”

  Kyle smacked him lightly on the arm and Alexei mock-scowled at him. “>”

  “>

  “>”

  “>”

  Alexei took another sip of the coffee, relishing the rich, bittersweet taste of it and the familiar bickering with his little brother. He missed working and fighting alongside Kyle. The last three months had been difficult for various reasons, not the least his own recovery, but he’d spent years with Kyle watching his six and vice versa. Knowing his little brother was in the field without him had left Alexei feeling anxious. The only reason it hadn’t developed into full-on internalized panic was because of Jamie.

  Alexei could count on one hand the number of leaders he’d served under and trusted wholeheartedly, and Jamie was at the top of that short list. Knowing that Kyle and the rest of their team was under Jamie’s leadership had gone a long way to easing his fears about not being with them on a mission.

  That didn’t mean he was happy about how long he’d been away.

  Therapy was something Alexei had a long history with. From the therapist assigned by the refugee relocation agency once they arrived in Boston all those
years ago, to the ones he’d seen while with Strike Force, his mental health had been a discussion point for years with a third party. While Alexei objectively understood why therapy was important for their line of work, he’d never particularly enjoyed it. The twist this time was the joint therapy sessions he shared with Sean.

  Those sessions were honestly the hardest for Alexei. Working through their shared trauma together was a minefield of emotions that he worried would never heal. The tension between them still hadn’t gone away and it frustrated Alexei to no end some days. Sean’s guilt was still a heavy thing he carried, no matter how many times Alexei assured the other man he didn’t blame him for what had happened with Cillian.

  As if he were the telepath on the team and not Katie, Kyle asked, “>”

  Alexei took another sip of coffee, thinking about how to answer. He wasn’t going to lie to his brother. They’d promised each other never to do that the first time Kyle had shown up at his house with a black eye when they were kids and before he was adopted by the Dvorkins. But finding the right words in any language was still hard.

  “>” Alexei admitted quietly. “>”

  “>”

  Cillian’s demand that Sean remain quiet or Alexei would endure worse pain had left Sean mute for several days until he finally showed up at Alexei’s old apartment. The brief moment of closeness that followed their reunion was the last time he’d held Sean in his arms longer than a few minutes, and Alexei fucking missed having Sean in his arms like that.

  They shared an apartment and slept in the same bed, but they never slept together. Alexei was always willing to have Sean close, but it was Sean who kept pulling away, kept parts of himself back, and it killed Alexei to see that.

  Alexei stared out the window at the passing street lamps and other cars as Kyle drove them toward the highway that would take them to the outer zones of the megacity where the base resided.

  “>” he said.

  Kyle glanced over at him, no judgment in his green eyes. “>”

  Alexei shook his head. “>”

  It always killed him to do so, but Alexei would never force Sean to stay if he didn’t want to. Alexei wasn’t going anywhere, even though his own private fear shared with no one other than Kyle, was that Sean would walk away. And Alexei, for all his stubbornness, would never keep someone with him who didn’t want to stay. But losing Sean would devastate him.

  That was a heart-wound Alexei was in no hurry to experience.

  “>” Kyle said.

  Alexei nodded tiredly. “>”

  “>”

  “>”

  “>”

  Alexei tapped his fingers lightly against the travel cup. “>”

  “>”

  “>”

  “> Kyle glanced over at him before taking a sharp turn on a yellow light, aiming for the highway entrance. “>”

  Kyle’s faith warmed Alexei like the last bit of coffee he had left in the travel cup. It stayed with him through the early morning drive to the base, right up to the passenger drop-off outside the front entrance of the main building.

  “>” Kyle said as Alexei got out.

  “>” Alexei replied.

  “>”

  Alexei leaned down and grinned at Kyle before tossing him the empty travel cup. “>”

  “>” Kyle waggled his eyebrows at Alexei. “>”

  Alexei rolled his eyes and shut the car door with a heavy hand. While he appreciated Kyle’s foresight back in November in bringing them together again, right now it wasn’t that simple.

  Alexei flipped him off. Kyle returned the gesture with a smile on his face. Their nonverbal symbol of brotherly love had started when they were both teenagers. Kyle’s support carried Alexei through the briefing with MDF Deputy Director Ranisha Stirling.

  “The results from your weapons recertification and physical training are in the highest percentile. Your undercover clearance will no doubt match the rest by tonight if all goes well. I have faith that it will and you can once again be cleared for active duty,” Stirling said.

  Alexei nodded, glancing over at Agent Melanie Carmichael, who gave him a quick, supportive nod.

  “You may not be in my division, but I won’t go easy on you,” Melanie said.

  “Not think you would,” Alexei replied.

  “This recertification test is to assess your undercover skills and response in the field. Let’s finish up here so you can get going,” Stirling said.

  The MDF wasn’t one to throw a spanner in the works of an ongoing mission by dropping in a recovering operative for a test. The MDF partnered with other agencies for training purposes, creating blind tests for agents and operatives to work through in cities across the United States.

  Alexei still didn’t know where he was going, but he figured it didn’t matter. All he needed to do was get the job done, like always.

  “You’ve done this before, haven’t you?” Melanie asked as they geared up in the ready room a little later.

  Alexei pulled on the suit jacket the MDF had provided for the occasion and made a face. The wool blend wasn’t as fine as the sort he was used to these days. Jamie’s taste seemed to have rubbed off on him.

  “Recertification?” Alexei asked. “Da. Is not new.”

  “Good. It’s always nice to be working with someone who knows what he’s doing.”

  Melanie winked at him, a smile curving her mouth as she tugged the hemline on her sheath dress into place. Her blonde hair had been curled in the popular style of the day while her expensive jewelry was borrowed from a jeweler for the occasion. She was tall and lithe, classically pretty, with an air of competence surrounding her that always caught Alexei’s eye, no matter the gender. She was a few years older than him and everything he used to like in women, back before his entire attention was caught up in Sean.

  It’d been almost two years since Alexei last slept with a woman. As much as he enjoyed the softness of the female form, everything he craved now took the shape of a man who seemed to be pulling away from him. The fear of losing Sean kept him up more nights than he cared to admit, but Alexei wouldn’t be the one to walk away from what they had. While he knew the recovery process had been harder for Sean, Alexei would be there for him always. Getting him to believe that seemed to be a never-ending fight these days.

  Alexei tugged at his tie, grimacing at how tight it felt around his throat. While normally he’d argue against wearing the damned thing, this was a test, and he needed to abide by the rules if he had any hope of being cleared for active duty sooner rather than later. Sean had passed all his field tests, an
d like hell would Alexei let him go back to active duty without him.

  “Ready?” Melanie asked.

  “Ready,” Alexei replied, already thinking ahead.

  Sixteen hours later found Alexei riding a high of success when he came off the field, knowing in his bones that he’d passed with flying colors. Active duty was within his reach, so close Alexei could practically taste it.

  “I realize I can’t officially let you know your results just yet, but I have to say, undercover work suits you,” Melanie said as they walked off the tarmac and into the main building at a brisk pace. At a little past 2100, the night was chilly, a far cry from the warm Los Angeles winter they’d left behind them.

  “Good practice,” Alexei said, thinking of the Pavluhkin mission that had taken up most of last year.

  “More like you’re a natural.”

  The way Melanie looked up at him through her lashes and the smile she shot him was flirty in a way that had worked in the field earlier today, but which had Alexei wondering why she was continuing the ruse. The test was over, and he didn’t have to stick around for a debrief since they’d be discussing his performance and he couldn’t be present for that.

  “I’m pretty sure the director will clear you after I turn in my report. That’s something worth celebrating, don’t you think? You up for a congratulatory breakfast tomorrow?” Melanie asked.

  Alexei opened his mouth to answer, when someone else spoke up.

  “Alexei.”

  His head snapped around, blinking in surprise at where Sean stood in the hallway, dressed in casual clothes, with his hands tucked into his jacket pockets. He was a much welcome sight, even if Alexei wasn’t sure what to make of the flatly neutral expression on his face.

  “Agent Delaney,” Melanie said in a frosty voice, a far cry from the warmth that had been directed at Alexei mere seconds ago.

  “Agent Carmichael.”

  Alexei had been with Sean long enough to recognize the flat tone of dislike in the other man’s voice. Why it was directed at Melanie, he didn’t know.