One

 

 

Morgan glanced over at the quiet, tense man in the passenger seat.  Oh, Ten was silent but he was by no means calm.  His knee was bouncing incessantly.  His fingers switched between drumming on his thigh or threading through his messy blonde hair.   After a few miles of driving he finally spoke.

“When?”

“I got a call from his partner last night. He hasn’t been at work for a few days, no call or anything.”

The devastation in Ten’s eyes when his head whipped around to look at Morgan was so clear it made Morgan’s heart squeeze in his chest.

“His, his, his partner?” Ten gasped out.

“His business partner, Ten, at his law firm.”

Ten’s head turned to look out the window, “Oh,” he mumbled. His fingers began picking at imaginary lint on his jeans.  He shrugged a shoulder, “No big deal if it was his life partner.  It’s not like I care or anything.”

Morgan barked out a laugh, “You don’t really expect me to believe that, do you?”

Ten glared at Morgan, “Fuck you, Morg, just fuck you.”

Ten turned back to the window and silently brooded for a few more miles until…

“How did you find out?”

Morgan knew that Ten was asking how he knew for sure that Bas was missing, not how he knew that Ten wanted Bas – because Ten still refused to admit that he wanted Bas, hence him disappearing from the man’s life almost a year ago now.

Ten knew he was a freaking coward but he just couldn’t fucking help it.

“We meet once a week for lunch.”

Ten looked back at him, “You do?  I didn’t realize that you were that close.”

“We served together for eight years, Ten.  Of course, we’re close.”

“Yeah, but once a week?”

“We didn’t used to meet that often.  It’s only recently that he wanted to make our meetings more frequent.”

“How recent?”

Morgan glanced over at Ten and Ten knew the answer before Morgan spoke it, “Oh, about a year ago.”

Ten winced.  He couldn’t help it.

“So, he just didn’t show up for lunch with you or at work?  What about that makes you think he’s missing.  Maybe he’s just off with some guy getting his rocks off.”

“A: because the only guy he’s ever talked about in the last year, and that was only when I forcibly dragged it out of him, was you. And B: I went to his place.”

“What did you find?”

Morgan sighed as he stared out the windshield.

“Morg?  What the fuck did you find?”

Morgan flicked on his blinker and turned into a driveway in front of a familiar, quaint, dark green and white craftsman home with a wraparound porch.  A house that Ten had only been to once in his life when he had been assigned to protect Bas and had to pick him up at his home and bring him out to Morgan and Luther’s cabin.  But he had seen it a million times since…..in his dreams.

“I’ll let you see for yourself.”

Ten’s practiced eyes perused the home and the yard and that was when he saw it.  “He’s moving?” he whispered, eyes locked on to the realtors for sale sign by the mailbox. Panic squeezed his heart in his chest at the possibility of him not knowing where Bas was.

“He said it was too crowded here, too pretentious, not him.  He wants something else outside of town.”

“Where?”

“Let’s just take a look around, okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, okay.”

Ten’s heart was pounding in his chest as he climbed the four steps to the porch behind Morgan.  As the man keyed in the code on the electronic door lock, Ten frowned.  “You know the code?”

Morgan didn’t turn around, but his shoulders lifted and dropped as he sighed, “Yes, Ten, I know the code for his house.  He’s my lawyer but more importantly, he’s my friend.  This is what friends do – they share, they interact, they let you in.”

“Don’t Morgan. Not now.”

Morgan mumbled something under his breath as he pushed open the door, something that involved the words, ‘stubborn’ and ‘ass.’

Ten didn’t blame the man.

He stepped inside and couldn’t help the sharp inhale of air that slipped past his lips.  Bas’s scent was everywhere.  It made his pulse race; his heart pound and his hands clench tight as it surrounded him.  It made him think of possibilities, of hope, of a future and that’s what finally had his eyes snapping open.  Because Tenley Pinkerton didn’t have a future, not one that would mean anything.  His future died the day his boyfriend was brutally murdered.

Ten shook his head to shake off the dark memories that were trying to creep their way inside.  He needed to focus, to concentrate.  Bas was missing, he was fucking missing.

He glanced around and didn’t see anything amiss.  No furniture overturned, nothing broken, nothing appeared to be out of place.

“You’re sure he didn’t just take a trip somewhere and not tell you?”

“I am,” Morgan said and there was something about the tone of his voice that raised the hairs on the back of Ten’s neck.

He looked over at the man.  Morgan was turned away from him and even though Ten couldn’t see his face, he could still see how tense the man was.

“He left you a sign, didn’t he?”

Just a tiny dip of Morgan’s chin answered Ten’s question.

“Is it bad?”

Another dip of the chin.

“Morg?”

The man’s head turned the slightest bit for his eyes to lock with Ten’s.

“Tell me.”

Morgan cringed and that really raised Ten’s hackles.

Morgan Doyle never cringed.

“I, I can’t.”

Ten blinked, “I’m sorry, what?”

Morgan turned towards the door, “We, we need to go.  I shouldn’t have brought you here.”

“What?  Are you fucking kidding me?  I’m not going any-fucking-where,” Ten pretty much growled at Morgan.

Morgan turned back and the torment in his eyes softened some of Ten’s anger.

“Morg, tell me what’s going on.  Does this have something to do with your time in the service?”

Morgan bit his lip and that terrified Ten because Morgan never got nervous, not ever.  But he was nervous now.

“Yes.”

“So, you think this has something to do with someone you crossed on one of your missions?”

Morgan shook his head, “No.”

“You think it has something to do with someone you served with?”

Morgan stared at Ten for almost a full minute before he dipped his chin and whispered, “Possibly, yes.”

Ten’s fingers slid through his hair, “Jesus Christ,” he muttered quietly as he glanced around.

“I need you to tell me, Morg.”

Morgan’s fists clenched and unclenched at his sides, “I can’t.”

Ten’s angry glare locked onto Morgan, “God damn it, Morgan! Fucking tell me!”

Morgan’s entire body began vibrating.  The man was shaking with fear.  Nothing scared this man and yet he was quaking in his two hundred-dollar loafers.  That had Ten’s own fear climbing into the stratosphere.

“I can’t,” Morgan whispered again.

Ten stomped over, grabbed the front of Morgan’s shirt and shoved the man backwards until his back slammed up against the wall, “I can’t help you, I can’t find him, unless you fucking tell me!”

Morgan’s eyes squeezed shut and a lone tear slipped down his cheek.  Ten tracked its path like it was the strangest thing he’d ever seen….because it was. Morgan Doyle never cried.

Ten’s arm was across Morgan’s chest, just below his collarbone, while the other hand still clenched his shirt.  He knew Morgan could’ve pushed him away, easily.  But he didn’t.  Instead his chest moved up and down as he took deep breaths, almost as if he were trying to gather the strength needed to say what he needed to say.

Fuck.  How bad could it be?

“There were four of us on that mission,” he finally whispered with his eyes still closed, almost as if he were afraid to look at Ten.

“Me.”

Ten’s heart rate increased.

“Liam,” he said with a hitch in his voice.

“Bas.”

He could feel his heart hammering in his chest.

“And Sawyer.”

Ten veered back as if he’d been slapped.  Sawyer?  His Sawyer?  His boyfriend Sawyer?  Suddenly Ten couldn’t breathe…..his knees felt weak….and then….blackness.