Hiding the Moon

by Amy Lane

  They situated themselves again, Ernie on his side so he could drape over Burton like a robe, and Burton spoke again. “Sonny is right to be scared. Ace quit racing for a really good reason.”

  “Too dangerous?”

  Burton gnawed his lower lip. “It’s not the danger—not completely. What I do is dangerous. But if something goes down, I know I’m the only one who has to deal with it. My folks’ll grieve, yeah, but I’m not so much a part of their lives. But Ace goes, and Sonny….” Burton shook his head. “Sonny will lose his shit. He will not be okay, and nothing anybody can do will make him okay. Ace’ll drive that car fast whether he races or not—but if Sonny’s not by his side, he’s taking a bigger risk than just their lives.”

  Suddenly Ernie couldn’t breathe.

  “I… I gotta go,” he mumbled, trying to pull out of the bedroll. It got tangled around his legs, and he ended up squinched up by the corner of the truck with Burton rolling over and trapping him flat.

  “What in the hell?”

  “I gotta go,” he repeated almost tearfully. He was picturing it. He could sense that big void opening up, a black hole in his soul and the sudden knowledge that Burton didn’t exist anymore, and Ernie, who had spent the last month marveling that he did exist, was bereft, a lost star adrift in the heavens. The sky, which had offered freedom and shelter, became a trap. Ernie needed to hide, hide in the cab of the truck, run to Ace and Sonny’s and hide in his bed, dig a hole anywhere and cover himself or he’d be trapped in the emptiness of beyond.

  “Ernie! Baby—God, tell me what’s wrong?”

  “What would happen to me?” Ernie shouted, an open nerve as he always had been.

  “You’re safe—you’re with Ace and Son—”

  “But it only works because you’re out there,” he said, voice breaking. “It’s everything I’ve ever wanted, but only if I know you’re breathing the same air. I can deal with you not being by my side, Lee, but you’ve got to be here in my world! Don’t you understand?” He stopped struggling to be free because, just like when he’d been locked in his military barracks, he understood it was fruitless. He’d learned how to fire a gun and how to fight there—but it had been for form, to give him structure, something to do, not because he was effective at it.

  Just holding the guns had given him hives they’d needed cortisone to get rid of.

  Ernie’s best defense was to become liquid. Water. A mirror to hold to the world but not a force that could change it.

  He stared up at Burton with that helplessness, that knowledge that he was at the mercy of the sun and the wind and the earth, and Burton did a shocking thing.

  He kissed him.

  Not hard—but thirsty. Pulling Ernie into his soul like Ernie would nourish him, keep him soft, keep him viable, keep him alive.

  Ernie couldn’t help but respond, to give him the only thing he had, the well of sweetness, of gentleness, that had been languishing at his heart, waiting for another person to come share in what he had to offer.

  “Sh….” Burton kissed his cheek, his tears, and Ernie tried to breathe, but it came out shaky. “Sh….” He kissed the other cheek, and Ernie nodded, like that would somehow make it okay. “Sh….” One more kiss, this one on his forehead.

  “I’ll be careful,” Burton promised, his voice as broken as Ernie’s had been. “I’ll be careful. I promise. I was trying so hard to not have anyone who’d miss me. You snuck up on me, kid. You snuck up on me, and I’m still looking behind me wondering how I have this person in my life.”

  And Ernie got it—he’d been afraid because he was water, but Burton had been afraid that he’d drown.

  “Sh…,” Ernie whispered, taking his lips again, and together they fell into a deep well, the kiss never ending, not even when they were naked again, their bodies moving silkenly under the sleeping bag, spending their sex over each other’s fists.

  BURTON DROPPED him off at Ace and Sonny’s in the small hours of the morning, long before dawn but long after Ernie usually came home.

  “They’ll be worried,” Ernie murmured, holding Duke close. “I usually knock on Ace’s door when I come in.”

  “Ace texted,” Burton told him, surprising him. “After we nodded off.”

  “Not me?”

  Burton grimaced. “I think he was trying to give you your space. But that doesn’t mean he wasn’t worried.”

  Ernie smiled fleetingly, warmed. A long time he’d lived without a safety net—it was nice to have one again. “Are you… is this going to get you in trouble?” he asked, because the question had haunted him, but he hadn’t wanted to ruin the night.

  “No.” Burton shook his head without equivocation. “I was pretty much granted shore leave as a reward for not beating the hell out of one of my commanders.” He grunted. “Prick.”

  But something else was bothering him. “What?”

  One of those laconic shrugs seemed to be Burton’s equivalent of That ice cube is an iceberg the size of Mars. Don’t hit it. “Your shark and your fish—they’re on the radar. I’m trying to protect them, Ernie—I swear I am. But it’s getting hard to keep the heat off.”

  Ernie grunted. “That’s….” He gnawed his lip. “Can they protect themselves?”

  “Not… I mean normally, yes. I think they’re pretty able. In fact, I think they could help put an end to this op. But the one guy is recovering from some pretty serious injuries. I’d like to give him another six weeks, you know?”

  Ernie nodded. “Do what you can. I think, if worse comes to worse, you can warn them—right?”

  Burton half laughed. “It would come as a shock to them both, I think, that I’ve been listening to them since Thanksgiving, but sure.”

  “What are they like?” The question had been burning in Ernie’s mind. He had such a clear vision of them—but it was like the difference between Cruller, the enigmatic soldier, and the man who’d just made love to Ernie until he felt like he could grow fruit trees in the desert.

  “They’re… well, not nice. I mean, good, but the hurt one is snarky and stubborn, and it’s a toss-up between whether he’s going to kill himself or the bad guys are going to do it. The other guy is a lawyer—he’s very… regimented. Just when I think they’re going to kill each other, they start kissing instead.”

  Ernie chuckled. “Sounds… well, not normal, but—”

  “But like normal’s what they’re working toward.” Burton nodded, staring thoughtfully through the window of the truck. “You always think that if you retire or stop, you’re going to do it cold. You’re either going to just retire and settle down and live a regular life, or you’re going to catch a bullet quick. You never think of maybe just fighting for normal when you’re at home and then jumping into the mix when you’re at work. You never think that maybe you can have them both for a while, and then you just alter the balance. These guys—that’s what I think they’re trying to do, you know?”

  “So….” Ernie’s heart pounded hard in his throat. “Do you think you just want to alter the balance?”

  Burton cocked his head and swallowed. “We’ll see,” he said cryptically.

  Ernie made a hurt sound—he couldn’t help it—and Burton was just there, crushing him into the seat, searing his senses with a kiss that felt nothing like goodbye.

  His phone buzzed—Ernie heard—and Burton groaned and ripped his mouth away. “We’ll do this again,” he said, like the words were torn out of him. “God, I’m going to need to taste you again.”

  “Then you’d better plan on coming back,” Ernie told him, needing to hear it.

  “Yeah, kid—but you better not prep like that for anyone—”

  “Only you. You keep coming back and I’ll keep needing you.” Oh, it was the truth.

  Burton nodded, kissed him hard on the forehead, and pulled away. Ernie took his opportunity to gather Duke and slide out of the truck into the cold.

  “Burton—be safe.”

  “You too.”

  Ernie
shut the door with a thunk, and Burton drove away. For a moment he just stood, watching the taillights disappear and wishing… wishing… but it was winter, and even the desert got cold this close to morning. Ernie ventured up the stairs and into the warm little house, giving Duke food and water and turning on the television before he knocked softly on Ace’s door.

  To his surprise Ace opened it a moment later.

  “You okay?” he asked, looking exhausted and worried in a pair of sleep pants and no shirt. Ernie was lucky he wore Burton’s mark on his skin both inside and out, because he could have been like Alba, another one of Ace’s casualties, if he hadn’t already been claimed.

  “Yeah. Uh, sorry—I should have texted about—”

  Ace shrugged. “You didn’t know how much you could tell us. I know. I gave Burton an earful about worrying us shitless, but you were just….” Ace squinted at him in the dim light from the television and then opened his eyes really wide. “Getting laid,” he said bluntly. “Jesus God, it’s a good thing you’re our resident vampire. You even got the bite marks on the neck. A shit-ton. You may want to hit Alba up for some makeup to cover those—just saying.”

  Ernie covered his face with his hands. “I have never in my life—”

  “Had sex? Because, boy, you are a walking advertisement for why whisker-burn is a good thing.”

  Ernie kept his face covered. “You know, I’ve been coming home by myself for a while now—”

  Ace grunted. “So. You’re coming home to us now, and we’re in your business. You and Burton. We care about you both. You break each other, we’re picking up the pieces. Be careful.”

  Ernie scrubbed at his eyes. “Sure.”

  “Bullshit. Just saying—if it goes sideways, we’ll be here. I promise.”

  Ernie looked at him through his fingers. “Even Sonny?”

  “Yeah. Even Sonny.”

  “Thanks, Ace.” Ernie nodded and then was taken completely by surprise when Ace ruffled his hair like he was a little kid.

  “Get some sleep. Your schedule is cattywampus as it is.” Then Ace went back to bed, and Ernie flopped down on the futon so he could watch some TV. His body was buzzing from the sex, from Burton’s marks on his skin, from the conversation that gave him all the hope. But while most of him was buzzing and cold from excitement, a teeny part of him was warmed, solidly, simply, and kindly, by the fact that he’d come home in the wee hours of the morning and somebody gave a shit.

  If Burton had given him nothing else, he’d given Ernie somebody who gave a shit.

  But he really had given him so much more.

  Christmas Star

  JASON, I need something. Burton was on the secure line, the one only Jason knew about.

  What?

  I need you to help me fake a death.

  Target?

  Incoming.

  Burton sent the entire jacket and then put that phone—recently charged—in his pocket and flushed.

  Three days before Christmas, and he had a job to do.

  He’d managed two more trips to see Ernie, making Friday night his unofficial night off. The last time he’d gone off campus, Collins had said, “Tell your girl if she wants a real man, I take Sundays off.”

  “So does she!” Manetti had joked, and Burton rolled his eyes.

  “My piece doesn’t stray for anyone,” he said mildly, but it rankled. Not that they assumed it was a woman—normative thinking was something he was used to capitalizing on—but that they were joking with him like a buddy.

  God, he hated everything they stood for.

  “That’s too bad, Oscar, ’cause you’re gonna be out of town Sunday. I was looking forward to something new.”

  Burton bit back the retort that his “midnight ride,” as Ernie had dubbed it the last time, might be a little too new for Collins’s little mind and concentrated on the being “out of town.”

  The last time Burton had been “out of town,” he and Jason had needed to have a quick conversation on whether or not Corduroy’s target was also of interest to the US government.

  Burton had lucked out last time. The guy had been a pig—not that being a pig usually marked someone for death, but this guy was a pig who made his money selling political information to US enemies and was in the process of turning that money into black market diamonds.

  And he sold opioids on the side.

  Burton might have taken him out for free, no recommendation needed, just because he didn’t want that guy breathing the same air as his little brothers, or Ace and Sonny… or Ernie.

  Especially Ernie.

  Burton’s kid might be completely legal and very adult, but he’d been ripe for the picking before Burton had come along.

  Or ripe for the pushing.

  Anything to help with the voices in his head—he’d said that before, and after feeling the waves of peace rolling off him in the desert, Burton had felt in his bones how much he’d meant that.

  So Burton’s taking out his last target was—as far as Burton was concerned—doing the world a favor.

  But this next trip out of town was not.

  Name: Troy Angelo Gonzales

  Age: 23

  Height: 6-4

  Weight: 170

  Nationality: Dominican American

  Occupation: Computer Nerd

  Crime: Accruing enough cryptocurrency by legitimate game play to unbalance a startup

  The owner of the startup wants him dead.

  Burton was at his com when his special Jason phone went off.

  Are you fucking kidding me with this guy?

  Nope. Next assignment.

  Hamblin or Lacey?

  Hamblin doesn’t do chump change.

  Burton had been watching the power dynamics of the two leaders, and while he detested them both on principle, he had to admit—Hamblin didn’t dick around.

  Hamblin did small countries and large cartels. He displaced stupid men from their pedestals and corrupt men from their fed-up families. He didn’t do the Ernies of the world—that had been a Lacey move. Burton’s last job had been a Hamblin hit.

  This one was Lacey, through and through.

  And worse than that—Lacey was just doing it to jerk Hamblin’s chain.

  Burton had heard the convo the morning after his first midnight ride. It was funny that they put him in charge of monitoring unsuspecting victims and didn’t think to wonder that he’d bugged their own damned office.

  “The new com guy… what’s his name?” Lacey had asked—fortunately on a Saturday when Rivers and Cramer were out running. Rivers was up to three miles without passing out—Burton was impressed.

  “Calvin Oscar,” Hamblin replied dryly. “He’s the only black man on the base—you’d think it would be easy to remember.”

  “That wasn’t my idea,” Lacey sneered.

  “No. You would rather have that poor pale hamster in the medical bay who can’t find his own shoes as opposed to a man like Oscar, who could find the shoes, tie them, fly them up in a helicopter, launch them, parachute down to the ground and shoot them, all while being wasted in the com room listening to lawyers fuck. But that’s your part of the operation—by all means, don’t let my opinion bother you.”

  Burton bit back a grin. Dammit. After being surrounded by Collins and Manetti—and yes, Saunders, the poor hamster in the med bay—it was good to at least listen to someone smart and snarky again.

  Seriously—Rivers and Cramer would never know that they saved his life by not being rampant dumbasses, and that was the truth.

  “I won’t,” Lacey snapped—which just went to show he might be long on ambition, but he had a very little brain. Hamblin may have been more amoral than Burton and his handler combined, but he was also damned smart. For starters, he’d objected to the fucking Corduroy symbol being flown above the military base, which was, as far as Burton was concerned, a good enough reason not to blow the guy away.

  And a really good reason to slip plutonium into Lacey’s oatmeal.
>
  “So,” Hamblin said, sounding bored, “what is your objection to Calvin Oscar?”

  “You let him off base.”

  “He’s my man. They’re not prisoners here. He’d more than earned a night away.”

  “But you have no idea where he went! How do you know—”

  “I don’t,” Hamblin said, and Burton could hear the shrug. “The same way you don’t know if your men are loyal. I pay well, I recruit for intelligence, and I try not to piss off my men. We work a dangerous business here, Lacey—if you want guarantees, perhaps you should sell insurance.”

  Burton pictured the smaller man inspecting his manicure. Hamblin’s operative mood seemed to be ice, and Burton wished Hamblin had been recruited by the good guys. He and Jason could have been an unstoppable force, for sure.

  “Do you think Collins would bug him?” Lacey speculated, and Burton rolled his eyes. Lacey had tried to bug him, but Burton had his own personal bug detector as an app on his phone. It had taken him thirty seconds to find the thing and five seconds to put it in the bed of another pickup truck parked at the burger place. That Lacey didn’t confess to trying now made Burton wonder how long before this operation crumbled on its own steam. Lacey wasn’t competent—and he knew it on just enough of a gut level to not trust anybody who was.

  Burton had said as much to Jason, but in the meantime, they’d both agreed: Lacey’s list of targets was as important as the operation itself. They needed to know where Lacey was making his contacts, because there were plenty of people who would pick that list up without compunction and execute the hits. In the meantime Burton was on for protecting as many of the nonsanctioned hits as possible.

  He was just glad he was the one behind the trigger for this hit, because it had been rough cluing Jason in to the other targets. They’d had to take out an asset, and Hamblin was still pissed—and still wary—that one of his men had gone down. He apparently hadn’t forgiven Lacey for the men who’d disappeared during Ernie’s hit—Lacey had sent five guys when one should have done, and three of the five were gone.