Nick gave that a melancholy smile. “We were all like that, to a degree. You can be disqualified from making Recon if you snore, but what they don’t realize is that after half a year, every one of us talked in our sleep. Or screamed.”
Zane emptied his glass and reached for the bottle to refill it. “I don’t think that’s something I’ve ever done. Talk in my sleep, I mean. Keep it bottled up, I guess.” Not to mention that a large part of the time he’d been undercover, he was sleeping with someone—or someones—he didn’t want knowing who he really was.
“Not healthy,” Nick chastised, smiling and lifting his own glass to his lips.
“Are you a friend of Deuce’s too?” Zane asked wryly.
“Ty’s brother? I’ve met him a few times. I don’t know, something about combining the Grady traits with psychological training didn’t sit right with me. Made me nervous.”
Zane laughed. “Grady traits? Like blustering out of tight spots and courage under fire?”
“And being crazy enough to pull off the impossible.”
“Gummi bears.”
“Cheetos. And that look, like he knows exactly what you’re thinking and he finds it funny.”
“I hate that,” Zane muttered, setting down his half-full glass.
“Me too,” Nick said, laughing and looking down at the ice in his glass again. “God, I miss him sometimes.”
Zane looked up at him, an uncomfortable feeling in the pit of his stomach. He didn’t want to imagine what it was like to miss Ty.
Nick was silent too, watching Zane in the dim light again and drinking his water without further comment. Finally, Nick smiled and looked away with a shake of his head. “Ty told you, didn’t he?”
It threw Zane for a moment, and he stared at Nick, wondering if he was headed for a showdown of some sort. “Yes.”
Nick nodded, still looking down at the glass he’d set on the counter. “I was hoping he’d forget.”
“He told me that night. As soon as he got home.”
Nick nodded. “His brand of morality is pretty unique,” he said as he looked up to meet Zane’s eyes. He straightened and put both hands on the counter. “I owe you an apology.”
Zane frowned, not sure how to handle the straightforward approach. “Am I actually going to hear it?”
“Depends,” Nick answered with an easy shrug. “Do you deserve it?”
“Yes,” Zane said, meeting Nick’s eyes.
Nick raised one eyebrow and cocked his head to the side. “Ty told me he was involved with you, that he loved you, and I should have respected that. I didn’t, and for that I’m sorry,” he offered, sounding sincere.
Zane nodded, noting how precisely Nick worded that apology. “Now tell me how you really feel,” he said, keeping his tone dry. He didn’t want to start an argument, but he did want to know where Nick stood. And he did still want to slug him.
Nick snorted and gave him a grim smile. “I think you’re one lucky son of a bitch, and I kind of want to hate you. The hell of it is, I know Ty. He won’t come looking for me unless you give him a good goddamn reason to.”
“I know I’m lucky,” Zane said as he realized that the little bundle of nerves he’d always had to deal with when he thought about love and Ty just wasn’t there. Was that confidence? Trust in his lover? Zane wasn’t sure, but he liked it.
Nick lowered his head, shaking it minutely. “In that case, for what it’s worth, I’m sorry for making a move on your boyfriend.”
It sounded so absurd that Zane huffed a laugh. “Thanks.”
“Yeah.” Nick stood for an awkward moment, obviously not sure what to say or do.
“If you weren’t so damn much like him, I’d probably have been able to hit you,” Zane told him, wondering where the urge to share was coming from and kind of wishing it would stop.
Nick looked up at him, expression guarded. “If we can be friends, it’d make our lives easier. And Ty’s.”
Zane nodded.
“You can tell he’s tense. I’ve been wondering if that’s because of me, or just life. But then, he never did like it when people tried to kill him.”
“No one likes it when people try to kill them.”
Nick smirked at that. He picked up his glass and turned to get more ice from the freezer. He moved deliberately, trying not to make any noise. He glanced toward the stairs again. When he turned back to the counter, he reached for his own bottle of water to refill his glass.
“He said you’ve been on the run pretty much nonstop,” he said to Zane. “You’ve got to be as exhausted as he is, why are you really up?”
“Honestly? You.”
“Ah.”
Zane glanced toward the stairwell, then back to Nick. “How close are you?” he finally blurted out. “I have no frame of reference, other than the oorah and your tongue down his throat.”
“Whoa, okay.”
“Well?”
“Right. Uh… we met on the bus ride to Parris Island. Stuck together for the next… ten years, I guess.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“Then you’re going to have to be more specific.”
Zane shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve never been able to really talk to one of Ty’s friends before, besides his brother. I guess I figured you might have some insight.”
Nick was already shaking his head before Zane finished. “Just treat him like you would when you unravel a slinky. That’s the best I can give you.”
“That’s disturbingly apt,” Zane murmured.
Nick’s lips twitched as he looked down at the glass in his hand. Zane looked at him, truly studying him. He was beginning to understand why this man was Ty’s best friend, coming out and kissing him aside.
“Anything else?”
Nick’s smile fell, and he nodded. “I’ve lost count of how many times over I owe him my life.” He looked at Zane hard, narrowing his eyes in the darkness. “There’s something you’re dancing around,” he said, confident in his assertion.
Zane sighed. He figured he must be really worn out if he wasn’t hiding his emotions as well as usual. Nick was reading him, and Zane wasn’t sure he cared. “I’m worried. This mess could go so bad so quickly, and you know him. He’ll be right in the middle of it.”