Undercover (Boyxboy)

Chapter Fourteen

Now that we were basically sitting ducks, waiting for Michael to touch down in JFK, it seemed that these prominent elephants in the room had to be addressed.

"Sure," I answered. I wasn't going to be immature about this — I wanted to hear what Tom had to say, honestly. But it wouldn't make a difference to the future — I planned on never seeing him again once all of this was over. That was if we survived, which I was having major anxiety over.

My anxiety was weakening however the longer I spent time with them — they held such determination that it was rubbing off on me. Perhaps I was being pessimistic and overly-cautious. Harry had labelled me as 'paranoid' yesterday... was I just being paranoid?

"Okay..." Tom cleared his throat uncomfortably, "How about we go outside on the balcony?" We had swapped to a different hotel in order to keep suspicions low — the staff were getting too familiar in the last hotel. Witnesses meant they could potentially be targets too. And I hated collateral damage.

I nodded wordlessly and followed him to the balcony. Harry pretended not to be looking at us but I could see he was watching from the corner of his eye. The curl of his lip once I turned to shut the balcony door told me he wasn't happy with the situation.

I didn't know whether it was the fact that Tom and I were speaking alone or that we had left him alone with Hugh that annoyed him more.

"So," I began, not allowing an awkward silence to taint this conversation, "I'm presuming you want to address some topics of our past? In particular your death — or your fake death, to be precise?"

I couldn't help the bitterness that seeped into my tone. Standing before me was a man who I had deeply loved many years ago. Yes, it was in the past. But a past that I had recently learned was a heap of lies and deceit. I had made peace with the fact that Tom was dead and that I would always have him in my heart.

Now that he was standing before me, there was no room for a living and breathing man in my heart — Harry had occupied every single space. I couldn't get past the fact that I had to say goodbye to a person I had already said goodbye to. The fact that Tom was alive had fucked me up more than his death.

"I never intended for you to ever find out... not like this, anyway," he muttered, stringing his fingers through his dark blonde hair.

"What does that mean?" I inquired, walking to lean against the iron frame of the balcony. The sun was disappearing behind some clouds, allowing me a better look at Tom once the glare went.

He sighed and started pacing before stopping. Yet another tell-tale sign of his that he was extremely nervous. "It means that I had no choice in the matter all of those years ago. My father was the Captain of the agency in Australia and once I turned eighteen, he gracefully told me that he wasn't in fact an engineer that travelled to developing countries to improve their infrastructure but the fucking Captain of a spy agency."

Tom had 'died' a month after his eighteenth birthday. I remember we used leftover paper plates and cups from his eighteenth at his funeral.

He took a breath and seemed to be getting more wound up. I used to soothe him by caressing his neck and massaging his shoulders and he would smile tiredly and apologise for getting so stressed... we rarely fought. It was like a polar opposite to the relationship I had with Harry.

Now though, I just stood and watched him panic. I wanted to smack myself when I felt my hand itch to reach out to him. I would not revisit the past. Fuck the past. I just wanted answers to move on with my life.

"Okay. So your father was the Captain. Why didn't you have a choice?" My voice held little expression and it was a struggle when I saw the anguish in his eyes.