Teague felt like a dead man walking. Every emotion, every question, every doubt and sliver of guilt he’d felt all these years hit him head-on like a Mack truck.

He’d stumbled into his house at two a.m., fucked Deanna senseless trying to ease the pain, then stumbled out again at five, telling her he wasn’t ready to talk yet, couldn’t deal with her and everything else.

Now, at nearly eight in the morning, he sat at his desk, his mind a tangle of so much darkness, he was afraid he’d never find the light again. And the one person it was logical for him to talk to was the one he just couldn’t bear right now. Because as much as he loved her and realized she’d done it for him, he kind of hated his mother. And a part of him hated Deanna for entirely different reasons.

He’d been ashamed to admit to himself as he walked around DC in the dark that he was jealous of Dee. All these years, he’d ignored the fact that the brother he’d once loved was in fact alive, but she’d known him—she’d talked to him, seen him, knew what he liked and didn’t. She’d been able to watch his accomplishments, help him with his needs—fuck, she’d heard his voice. He remembered Roland’s deep voice when he used to comfort Teague when he was in middle school and struggling with the gang kids.

“Once you grow, they’ll leave you be, little T. Until then, you remember that you’re twice as smart as they are. The smartest always wins in the end.”

It wasn’t too long after that that Roland joined the Gangster Disciples. Teague always wondered if he’d done it to keep them from threatening Teague. The very thought made his stomach heave in anticipation of emptying its contents.

He swallowed the bile and looked blankly out his office window. He was fortunate that he didn’t have any meetings on the Hill today, but he wasn’t going to be able to get any work done like this.

Supreme Court nomination be damned, he needed to get someone else’s take on this. Someone he could trust with the information, someone who wasn’t Kamal, because he’d be obligated to tell the president, who would be obligated to tell the Senate.

He looked at a photograph on his bookshelf, a picture of the entire Powerplay club at an event three years ago—Kamal, Derek, Scott, Jeff, and Gage, who’d been out of the country dealing with problems with his union’s negotiations in Canada for months now. He’d always kept those men at a small distance, fearful that if they knew the deepest part of his history, they wouldn’t continue to support him. He knew it was irrational—his fear of being betrayed and tossed aside because of who or what he was—but that didn’t make the paranoia go away. Deanna had devastated him so completely when she’d left him all those years ago, he’d never been able to trust that his race wouldn’t become an issue for others in his life.

And nothing said black man like a brother in prison. It was shameful that he’d allowed those kinds of thoughts to keep him from being his true self with people all these years. And worse, he’d let it keep him from loving his brother. It was sobering and sickening at the same time to realize the extent of his own cowardice.

It was also time to put an end to it.

He stood and grabbed his jacket off the back of the chair before walking out his office door. “I’ll be back in time for my eleven o’clock,” he told his secretary before opening the door to the stairwell. He knew exactly where he was going and exactly what he had to do, and that was a vast improvement over the last twelve hours.

* * *

Colonel Jefferson Thibadeux was an imposing figure in his full uniform. Teague liked to tease that he was “bedazzled,” but everyone knew what all the medals and ribbons meant—he was a badass.

And as he met Teague on the lawn outside the Pentagon, Jeff didn’t have a single stitch out of place. His hair was regulation, his steps were crisp, and his movements efficient. Teague didn’t know if it was how Jeff had been before the military, but he’d been this way for so long now, he wouldn’t be him without it.

“Thanks for meeting me,” Teague said as Jeff reached him and shook his hand, giving him a pat on the back at the same time.

“Sure thing. I have about forty-five minutes before my next meeting. Should we walk?” He gestured across the vast lawn, where a few benches were installed.

Teague nodded, and they set off, no particular destination in mind, but away from any prying ears or eyes.

“I assume this is about your nomination,” Jeff said steadily.

Teague nodded. “I haven’t been completely honest with you,” he said.

Jeff raised an eyebrow but didn’t do anything beyond that.

“I have something—dirt—that could scuttle the nomination…”

“Go on,” Jeff encouraged.

“I’ve mentioned my brother a few times.”

“The one who was killed in prison?”

“Yes. Only he wasn’t—killed in prison. He wasn’t killed at all—yet, anyway. He’s alive, and sitting in solitary in San Quentin. Life without parole.”

Jeff was quiet as they continued walking. One arm held his dress hat firmly wedged between his elbow and rib cage, the other swung smartly with each step.

“You’re not surprised…” Teague said, watching the other man carefully.

Jeff stopped walking and turned to look at him. “No, I’m not.”

“You knew?”

“Yes.”

“Since when?”

“Always,” Jeff answered.

Teague started walking again slowly, and Jeff kept pace.

“How? And why?”

“You know we vet new members.”

“So do Derek and Kamal know too?”

“No.”

Teague stopped again and stared at his friend. “You were in charge of vetting me, and you didn’t report it to them when they discussed my membership?”

Jeff shrugged as if the issue weren’t of great importance when Teague knew full well it was.

“I checked it all out carefully. I figured it was something to do with family dynamics, not a security issue.”

“But this could tank my nomination. I owed Kamal that info at the very least if he was going to back me.”

Jeff looked away for a few minutes, then pointed to a bench, where they both sat, on opposite ends.

“Look, I wasn’t being disloyal to Kamal. I just…” He seemed to consider how he was going to proceed for a moment. “You know where I come from, what kind of people.” He scratched his head. “I know what it’s like to work to pull yourself out of a cesspool, and sometimes that cesspool is full of people you need to pull away from as well. People who poison you or your dreams.”

Teague nodded in understanding. Even though Roland hadn’t ever been bad to Teague, he was a wound in their little family that never healed when he was there. Of course, cutting him off had only allowed it to scab over. The raw, tender place was still there just underneath the surface, and until last night, Teague had gotten adept at ignoring it, making sure never to touch it, always working around it to ensure it didn’t reopen. Now it was split wide and bleeding all over everything.

“I left my father behind when I turned eighteen, and I never looked back,” Jeff continued. “He was poison to me. I figured that your brother was much the same thing for you, and unless I saw a direct threat to one of the Powerplay members or our overall agenda, then I wasn’t going to force you to bring him back into your life. In the final analysis, I decided that we have no way of knowing for certain what effect his presence will have on your nomination, so I didn’t see the point in bringing him into it.”

“I’m not sure what to say about all that. But I found out last night that my ex-fiancée—well, my current…I don’t know what to call her—”

“Yours,” Jeff said, smirk fully in place.

Teague gave him a wry smile. “Yeah, that… She’s been in contact with Roland—my brother—for years. She swears they never mentioned my name, and she was in contact with him under the guise of research for an ongoing story on life sentences in prisons.”

He then told Jeff the story of Brice Carter, and Deanna’s efforts to throw her boss off the scent of a scandal.

“Do you want me to have Brice watched?” Jeff asked.

Teague shook his head. “You’re scary, you know that?”

“You used to say that about Kamal until the president tamed him and made him behave.”

“Yeah, I don’t see you ever giving up the danger zone for a woman.”

Jeff scowled. “Women are a danger all their own,” he answered darkly.

They sat in silence for a moment, each lost in his own thoughts.

Finally, Jeff glanced at his watch and stood. “What do you want to do next?”

Teague followed him as they went toward the massive structure that housed America’s military command.

“I don’t know, but I’m not sure I can continue to act as though I don’t have a brother anymore.”

“Think it over. And if there’s anything I can do to help, let me know.”

Teague thanked him and turned to make his way back to the parking lot.

“Teague?” Jeff called. “If I had the chance to see my father again, I wouldn’t take it. And I never even considered it. The fact you are might be telling you something.”

As he drove back to DC, Teague couldn’t stop hearing Deanna’s voice in his head: “He’s brave. So incredibly brave… He’s not afraid to die in there.”

* * *

Deanna spent the entire day on tenterhooks, waiting for a text or a call that never came. Brice was off her back, seemingly convinced of Teague’s squeaky-clean reputation, but she hadn’t heard from the man she loved since he left her in bed at five a.m., muttering that he couldn’t face her yet, he needed more time.

Well, she was happy to give him time, but that didn’t mean she was going to leave him alone. So, at six o’clock when she’d filed her newest story, she went home, changed into comfortable clothes, grabbed a duffel bag with things for work the next day, and took a Lyft to Teague’s.

When she knocked on his front door, the house was dark and even the surrounding street was quiet. She listened for his footsteps inside but was met with silence. She knocked again and rang the bell, until finally she had to accept that he either wasn’t there or wasn’t going to let her in. Her shoulders fell as she realized that even though he’d come home and crawled into bed with her, he might not want her anymore. She’d lied to him again, and now she was paying the price. Tears pricked the backs of her eyes as she considered the possibility that she’d lost him for good this time.

“Dee?” His deep voice startled her as it floated up from the bottom of the stairs in the darkness.

She whirled, nearly losing her balance, but he lunged up two steps and caught her by the elbow. “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you,” he said softly. They stood, eye to eye when he was on a lower step than her. His breath was warm as it fanned across her face, and the point where he touched her elbow was on fire, sending shock waves through her entire body.

“I’ve been worried,” she told him.

He nodded. “I’m sorry, I should have called. Will you come in?”

God, yes, she wanted nothing more than to be inside with him, safe from the demons in her mind and those in the bigger world.

He reached around her and slipped his key into the door, then swung it open before gently pushing on her lower back to indicate she should go on in.

Once inside, he led her to the kitchen and poured her a glass of cabernet and himself a gin and tonic.

“Come sit down,” he said, his face still serious, demeanor detached.

In the living room, her heart beat a million times a minute as she watched him sit too far from her to touch.

“I spent a lot of time thinking today,” he told her, eyes on the window. “Turns out more people know about my brother than I thought.”

Her breath hitched in her throat.

“My friend Jeff has known all along. It’s a long story, but he had reason to have me vetted for something years ago and found out about Roland. But he never told anyone.”

Her mouth rounded into a small O. “Do you believe him?”

“Absolutely.” He stood then and paced to the window. “But all this just makes me see how foolish I’ve been all these years—thinking that I could make Roland disappear. Pretending that what’s happened to him isn’t really part of me.”

Deanna watched him sadly. She was ready to do anything he asked—continue to hide his secret, help him bring it out in public, take him to meet his brother. It had to be his decision, but she would abide by it no matter what.

“My mother had good intentions all those years ago. I don’t blame her, she did what she thought was best, but I’ve been an adult—a very well-educated one—for years now. I know the law, I know ethics, I understand what’s right and what’s wrong. There is no excuse for me continuing to lie to the world about who Roland Smith is. No excuse except pure cowardice.”

He turned then and looked at her, his eyes tired and soft. “I’m ashamed of myself,” he said, his voice almost a whisper. “I’ve been walking through life full of shame that I didn’t even know was there.”

She stood, moving to him smoothly and without a moment’s hesitation. Her hands cupped his face as she spoke, her words slicing through the tension that swirled around them.

“You have nothing to be ashamed of. You were a boy. Your mother made a decision, and you’ve been abiding by it. You were walking a path that almost no one does, and even less so someone raised where you were. It’s not easy becoming the hope of a whole community. Whether anyone said it out loud or not, you knew they were all counting on you. Cheering for you to make it, not just to do okay, but to become something big, a symbol. And it wasn’t only your mother’s church friends, it was every teacher and coach who ever knew you. It was all the social workers in the schools and at the community center.”

“It was every mother of a black child in Chicago,” he said, giving her a rueful smile.

She nodded. “I’m right, aren’t I?”

“Yes.” He sighed. “But it never felt like pressure, only encouragement.”

“So you wouldn’t have felt like you’d let them down if you hadn’t made it through law school or gotten a partnership in a prestigious firm?”

“Okay, you’re right, there was pressure.”

She opened her mouth to tell him that was why he couldn’t blame himself for agreeing to leave Roland behind, but he interrupted her.

“But there is no excuse for what I did. Not all the expectations in the world. No matter how much pressure I felt, I had no right to deny who my brother was—who I am. I may be a Yale law graduate and a partner in an international law firm, but I’m also a poor black kid from the projects in Chicago whose brother is incarcerated. And to ignore that is to lie to the world. No Supreme Court justice should do that.”

And that was when she knew that he was going to withdraw his name from the nomination. That he was going to give up on his dream of making the highest court in the land.

“Teague, no…”

He looked at her with his tired, sad eyes, and her heart nearly split in two. “It’s okay, baby. I’ve been thinking about this for nearly twenty-four hours.” He lifted her fingers in his. “I think I might have found something more important than being on the Supreme Court.”

Her eyes filled, and she threw her arms around his neck, clinging to him with sorrow and hope.

“There’s no point in being the most important judge in the country if you’re not the most important in someone’s heart. Am I? Am I the most important to you?”

“Yes,” she whispered, holding his gaze with hers. “You are the most important person in my heart always.”

“Good,” he answered, his voice a mere breath as his lips found hers and began to tease. A flutter on the corner of her mouth, a graze on her jaw, a nip along her lips.

“When will you tell the president?” she asked, breathless.

“Meeting with her first thing in the morning.”

“What should we do until then?”

He chuckled darkly, and then scooped her up, heading toward the master bath.

* * *

Getting undressed was the easy part, but now Teague’s head was between Deanna’s legs as she stood under the hot spray of water. His tongue was working magic so intense, she wasn’t sure she could keep standing.

“So damn sweet,” he murmured as he licked decadently up her center.

She cried out, all her nerve endings stretched past the point of pleasure, heading on toward an aching pain that she craved.

He pushed her back against the granite-tiled wall of the oversized shower and pinned her with one hand on the flat of her stomach. Then he used his other to drive her over the brink, thrusting, twisting, pumping in and out while his tongue played with her clit, little circles, quick flicks, long strokes.

“Teague, oh God!” she cried as her core pulsed and throbbed over and over. When she finally came down from the highest high she’d ever had, she slumped against the wall, her eyes closed, water streaming down her chest.

Teague worked his way up her torso, all tongue and hands. When he reached her face, he grinned, obviously proud of himself.

“Stop it,” she chastised.

“What?” he asked, batting his eyelashes as if that could make him appear innocent.

“Stop with your arrogance. As if your ego needs more stroking.”

“Baby, I just got you off in under five minutes, including the undressing part. That’s a new record, and frankly, I deserve a little pat on the back for it.”

She reached around his broad chest and patted him on the shoulder blade. “There you go.”

“You’re a bad girl, Deanna Forbes,” he hissed, narrowing his eyes at her.

“Are you going to punish me for it?” she asked in a deliberately small voice.

* * *

Two hours later, Teague groaned as he came for the second time, his chest to Dee’s back as he held her hands pinned to the mattress, her face pressed into a pillow, hair a tumble of curls, dark against his white linens.

He pulled out slowly, running his hands reverentially down her back. God, she was gorgeous. And wild. He’d forgotten how sexual she was. Lush, hot, and ready for him all the time.

“Best news I ever got was when you told me you had that IUD. It’s so much better bare,” he growled, making her giggle.

She rolled onto her back, pulling the long strands of hair out of her face. “I don’t think I’ll be able to walk ever again,” she muttered, her chest heaving with her rapid breaths.

He collapsed next to her, both of them staring up at the ceiling. “I’ll bring you food three times a day…and water.”

“What about when I need to pee?”

“A chamber pot?”

“Gross,” she muttered, and they both laughed before he pulled her into his arms, arranging her how he wanted, one of her strong legs flung across his, her head on his chest, her arm banded across his abs.

“Are you really going to be okay?” she asked. “You’ve wanted the Supreme Court for so long.”

“I’ll be okay, baby, but thank you for caring.” He placed a tender kiss on the top of her head as he ran his fingers through her hair. “I have a great career that I love, my mom is healthy and happy, I have good friends, and you, right? I’m the fucking envy of the world. And now I won’t have to put up with that stuffy jerk Justice Warner every time the Supremes hear a case. I know I’d have to write every single dissenting opinion when he wrote the majority. The man’s a racist asshole.”

She hugged him tighter. “And what about Roland?”

He tensed, still not used to hearing or saying his brother’s name. It had been a very long time since Roland was part of the world Teague lived in, and it was going to take some getting used to.

“I think I need to go to California and see him.”

“Are you sure?”

“He deserves at least that much, Dee.”

“You know he’s not angry with you, right? He agreed with your mom, and he’s been happy just knowing that you’re succeeding and having a great life.”

His heart ached, and he had to breathe through the pain. He’d been to a solitary unit once, during criminal law at Yale. They’d done a project where they shadowed practicing attorneys. He’d seen the blankness in the inmates’ eyes, the utter hopelessness they exhibited, and the way everyone seemed to see right through them, as though they were already gone and their bodies were simply husks left behind.

It was no wonder that Roland was so quick to accept Teague’s abandonment. He’d been abandoned by everyone—his family, his friends, his community, the penal system, society as a whole. It was a way of life for him. It was, in fact, what he expected.

“Whether he holds it against me or not, I need to see him. I need to talk to him and find out who he is now.”

She squeezed him a bit tighter. “Okay. Do you want me to call and tell him you’re coming?”

“Would he prefer that?” Teague asked, not missing the irony that he had to ask his girlfriend about the most personal details of his own brother’s preferences and wishes.

She seemed to consider it for a moment. “I think I’d better warn him. I’m not sure what he’ll think, and I wouldn’t want him to feel like he didn’t have a say in it.”

Teague shifted, putting her on her back, underneath him, where he gazed into her eyes, his heart a runaway train. “God, I love you,” he whispered, and her eyes grew wider. “It’s too soon, and it’s crazy, and it seems like we always have something or someone against us, but I love you, Deanna Forbes. I love your beautiful heart and your kind soul. I love the way you fight for what you believe in, and the way you’re willing to admit when you’ve made a mistake. I love that you came back to me even after all these years, and that you were brave enough to leave your family when they were so wrong about the world and the people who live in it. Because that did take a lot of guts, baby, so please don’t think I ever take it for granted.”

Then she pulled his face to hers and kissed him fiercely, pouring so much of herself into it, he realized he was absorbing her, making her a part of him, something that he’d never lose again. She was his, and he was hers, and nothing could change that, not even a brother in prison.