Give and Take (Ties That Bind Book 1)

by Claire Cullen

  Sam paced back and forth in front of the dispatcher’s desk. She glared at him once but didn’t say anything. His boss’s boss has been called in, as had a man in a suit he didn’t recognize.

  While he waited, a woman arrived, declaring herself Drew’s attorney. After a flurry of suspicion and confusion, they worked out Diego had sent her. Sam was relieved, given how messy the situation was.

  Hours passed, and he moved from reception to the gym, passing the time on the treadmill. Anything to take his mind off things.

  Tom had insisted he stay outside and not be an active part of the team going into the warehouse. He’d heard the shot and the confusion afterward. It was a long few seconds before someone declared Drew safe.

  It was Tom who came to find him, long after midnight, taking a seat next to him on one of the benches lining the gym.

  “They’ve made a deal. Drew’s testimony against Russell in exchange for immunity from prosecution.”

  “Drew hasn’t done—”

  “I know you believe that and I think you’re probably right. But we both know the actual truth can get lost in a case like this. Russell will be only too happy to point fingers. This way, regardless of what Russell says, Drew will be safe. Once this is over, he’ll be free to live his life without a potential prosecution hanging over him.”

  “What happens now?”

  “Given what Russell just attempted, they want Drew in protective custody. They’re going to move him to a safe house tonight.”

  He nodded slowly. “Can I see him?”

  “They’re hashing out a few details. Once they’re done, I’ll try to give you two a few minutes.”

  ‘Hashing out a few details’ took another two hours then Tom ushered him into the room, shut the door, and he was alone with Drew once again.

  The other man looked exhausted, his head pillowed in his arms on the table.

  “Drew?”

  He jerked awake. “Sam? How long do we have?”

  “Not long. A few minutes at most.”

  “They didn’t give me a lot of options. Cora—she’s the lawyer Diego sent—she said it was a good deal and they’ll keep me safe until after the trial. They were already investigating Russ, they just didn’t have enough to take it further.”

  “And now they do.”

  “Thanks to you.”

  “To both of us. We make a good team.”

  Drew stood, stepping towards him.

  “I’m leaving tonight. I’m not sure for where. So I guess this is goodbye.”

  “It doesn’t have to be.”

  Drew pressed against him, burying his face in the crook of Sam’s neck.

  “I wish…” Sighing, he lifted his head. “Sam, this trial will take months, probably years, before there’s any resolution. I can’t ask you to wait for me. We barely know each other.”

  He traced Sam’s collarbone over his sweater and Sam wrapped his arms around him, holding him close and pressing a kiss to his cheek. Drew turned his head and their lips met, slow at first, then urgent, aware that time was short. When the need for air became greater than their need for contact, they broke apart.

  “Don’t wait for me, Sam. Go, live your life, find someone who doesn’t need rescuing all the time.”

  Sam trailed his thumb under Drew’s lip, drawing a shiver from him.

  As much as he didn’t want to admit it, he knew Drew was right. Besides, when all this was over, Drew wouldn’t need him anymore.

  He leaned in again, pressing a final chaste kiss to Drew’s lips.

  “Take care of yourself. Be brave and don’t lose sight of why you’re doing this.”

  Drew clung to him for another moment, his hands fisted in Sam’s sweater, his eyes locked on Sam’s.

  “I won’t. And I won’t forget what you did for me. Not ever.”

  There was a perfunctory knock with just enough time for them to pull apart before the door swung open.

  “Time to go, Andrew,” Drew’s attorney, Cora, said. Behind her were two federal officers. Drew swallowed hard, giving Sam one last glance and a wobbly smile. “They said no outside contact. Can you let Logan know I’m okay? And Diego, if he makes contact with you?”

  “Of course. Be safe, Drew.”

  “You too, Sam. And take care of Matt.”

  “Always.”

  He forced himself not to follow them out, knowing it wouldn’t make things easier. Instead, he focused his mind on replaying those last few moments they’d had together, how Drew looked, how his voice sounded, how his lips tasted.

  Tom interrupted him a while later.

  “Come on, Sam. I’ll take you home.”

  Sam was grateful he didn’t say anything else.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  There was this feeling he carried inside him from the moment he and Drew parted. He struggled to name it, to describe it, only knowing that it felt like something had been switched off within and nothing he did seemed to turn it back on.

  The hours and days moved slowly, like molasses. He’d never understood that saying before, his life lived at a frenetic pace with action required at a moment’s notice. And that was still true, but even those sporadic bursts of activity seemed to have slowed down. Conversations dragged, music and television sounded like they were in monotone. His thoughts were devoid of color. Except when he dragged up his memories of Drew. Those were everything his waking life was not. In high definition, surround sound and almost, he could imagine, 3D, were it not for the fact they existed solely in his head.

  He did what everyone suggested after a break-up, because even though they’d never got together, it was the closest thing he could equate it to. And something people understood better than ‘my more-than friend had to go into federal protection as a witness against the multimillionaire CEO of a company who was up to his neck in fraud and murder’. That one didn’t exactly roll off the tongue, either.

  His team were understanding. Better than that. They were there, dragging his ass out of bed on days off to go running, to the gun range to practice, or whatever activity they thought might take his mind off things.

  And while he knew they knew, and vice versa, he was content not to have it said out loud on the understanding, from Tom and the rest of them, that if he needed to talk about it, he would and could. What was there to even say?

  One week became four, and he felt he was just treading water, time passing with barely any notice.

  Tom sat him down after work one day.

  “How are you holding up?”

  If he had to ask the question and phrase it like that, it was fair to say that what Sam was struggling with had spilled over into his work.

  “I’m not doing as well as I’d like to be.”

  “Yeah, I can see that. I thought maybe a change of pace might suit you? Just for a few weeks?”

  “You’re not demoting me to traffic cop, are you?” he asked with a grin. It was a long running joke on the team that if you rubbed Tom up the wrong way, you’d spend a week doing traffic stops as punishment.

  Tom grinned back at him. “Now there’s an idea. Nothing so pedestrian, I’m afraid. Feds are short a few officers at a facility nearby. They’ve asked for us to send someone. I thought I’d give you first choice.”

  “Any particular reason?”

  “Other than the fact that you’re like a walking zombie half the time? A change of scenery might do you good. Meet some new people, make some friends, renew some acquaintances.”

  When he glanced up, there was an unmistakable twinkle in Tom’s eyes.

  Matt was starting to come around, physically at least. The weight loss had stopped and he’d gradually started to fill out again. He was sleeping too, his eyes no longer strained, the lines of exhaustion gone from his face. He was still anxious, still jumpy, but he seemed to come out of it quicker.

  “They’re talking about moving me out into their day program in a few weeks’ time,” he said to Sam one day as they passed a basketball back
and forth in the exercise hall. Now that Matt’s energy was building, they’d encouraged him to be active and he’d taken that to heart. There were a few other patients and visitors milling about but no one near enough to disturb them.

  “How do you feel about that?” Sam asked, unable to glean the answer from Matt’s expression.

  Matt shrugged. “I’d like to say I was happy about it but I guess I’m more worried. Like, what if it doesn’t work and I slide backward? I’m not sure I can crawl back out of this a second time.”

  “We’d never let it get so bad again, Matt. You understand what you’re going through better, and so does your family, and so do I. We’d act sooner, we wouldn’t leave you at a loose end as long as we did.”

  “That wasn’t your fault. I kept telling you I was okay, that I’d pull myself out of it.”

  “We both knew that wasn’t going to happen, long before you hit rock bottom.”

  “Still doesn’t make it your fault.” He went back to throwing the ball, aiming and missing the hoop. “Damn.” He passed the ball back to Sam. “My Mom has said she’ll stay with me for a few weeks while I settle into the program and my sister will come and stay for a while after that, if I need her to.”

  “So what’ll you do, in the program?”

  “It’s like what I do in here, only less intense. There’ll be groups and one on one. They have a PTSD group, which is something the hospital doesn’t have for inpatients, so that’ll be good. But Declan stopped by to tell me they’re also starting a new group for veterans with PTSD at the VA, so I might join that instead or as well. There’s a lot of options.”

  “Options are good.”

  “They’ve said not to think about returning to work for at least three months. Just because of the environment being so similar to being out in the field. The chaos, the noise, the pressure.”

  “And you’re okay with that?”

  Matt made a face. “For now. I want to get back to it, my hands are itching for something to do. But I think going back too soon, when I haven’t got a handle on managing my responses to the kind of triggers I’ll find there, would bring me back a few steps.”

  “You’re right. Over-prepare for the eventuality.”

  “Declan suggested doing some desensitization stuff beforehand. He’s looking into finding me someone I could shadow on shift, just as an observer, so I get to be immersed in the environment, without any of the responsibility.”

  “I think Declan knows his stuff.”

  “Yeah. Thanks for putting us in touch.”

  “Right place, right time. I didn’t do anything special.”

  “You got me where I needed to be, before it was too late.” Matt passed him the ball. “Speaking of where people need to be, how are you doing on getting over Drew.”

  Sam, in the middle of trying to shoot a hoop, made a complete mess of it, the ball hitting the backboard and bouncing off to the side.

  “That bad, huh?”

  He glared at Matt but Matt only smiled. “Tell me again how you two left it?”

  “I told him we made a good team. He told me not to wait for him, that a trial could take years. We said goodbye, he told me he’d always remember me.”

  “This is typical Sam territory, though. He needed you. You needed him to need you. Now he doesn’t need you anymore. You’re usually as good at moving on as they are. What’s wrong this time?”

  “I guess, for me, it wasn’t all about being needed. There was a part of me that just wanted Drew for me.”

  Matt, about to shoot another hoop, paused and set the ball down.

  “Let’s sit down for a minute.”

  They sat side by side on the benches lining the hall.

  “Do you think he felt the same?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t exactly get the chance to ask him and it wasn’t like we had time to test the theory, either.”

  “But…”

  “But it seemed like he wished things were different. He told me to go out and find someone who didn’t need rescuing all the time.”

  “So are you planning to wait for him, wiling the time away pining for him? Because by the time he gets untangled from this mess he’s in, he’ll be a different person. You won’t just be able to pick up where you left off. And he probably won’t want a reminder of the past. I hate to say it, Sam, but I think you’re setting yourself up for a hard fall.”

  “There’s a chance I might be able to see him sooner. To spend some time with him, just the two of us.”

  “And you’re managing that how?”

  Sam filled him in on Tom’s temporary transfer offer.

  “But I’m not sure it’s fair on Drew. Or on my team. I don’t want to be there because I want a career change or I’m really invested in protecting witnesses, I’d be there because…”

  “You want to jump Drew’s bones, right. I can see the conundrum.”

  “So, what do I do?”

  “Oh, well that bit is easy,” Matt said, springing to his feet and retrieving the ball. “For once in your life, Sam, be selfish. You like Drew and he seems wholly receptive to that, whatever about the baggage he’s carrying. Take the chance that you might wind up happy. Your job will wait, your life will wait. Convince Drew that you’re willing to wait, too.”

  Chapter Thirty

  It wasn’t the fancy prison Russ had constructed for him and it wasn’t prison prison, but Drew still felt every bit the caged animal that came with staring at the same four walls day after day. It would have been bearable, or so he believed, if it hadn’t been for Morton.

  Frederick Morton was in his late forties, well built, grouchy and, there was no way to get around it, homophobic. His constant cutting remarks, from Drew needing a babysitter lest he get a paper cut, to long expositions about the risk of him taking the 'easy way out' because of his inherent weakness, made clear his feelings on Drew’s orientation.

  Maybe it wouldn’t have been such a big deal if Morton wasn’t in there with him almost every waking hour. Another officer took over at the weekends and Morton went home to his wife, a brief reprieve.

  “She prays for you,” he liked to tell Drew. “Prays for your soul. She’s more forgiving than I am. She thinks someone like you can be saved.”

  The other officers were almost invisible compared to Morton, who was relentless not just in his words but in his deeds. Like barging into rooms like a bull for no other reason than to startle him. He especially liked to do so at night, shining a torch in Drew’s face and yanking off the bedclothes under the guise of making sure he hadn’t slit his wrists in the night.

  The longer it went on, the more convinced Drew became that Morton was actually attempting to drive him to suicide rather than protect him from the eventuality. The idea of weeks of this, let alone months, was enough to strain his soul. He tried sounding out one of the other officers about it and Cora too on one of her infrequent visits. The officer shut him down quickly, not wanting to get involved. Cora listened, somewhat sympathetic, but he could tell it wasn’t her priority. She had other things, other cases. And his slow torment at the hands of his protector wasn’t high up on her list.

  When she came back on her next visit, she seemed taken aback. “You’ve lost weight. Are you eating?”

  With constantly disrupted sleep, he’d lost his appetite. When he tried to brush it off, she became more insistent, and he admitted, ashamed to feel himself tear up, that Morton’s behavior had only gotten worse since she’d last been there.

  “I’ll have a word with whoever his supervisor is, see if something can be done.” She sounded doubtful, and he didn’t hold out much hope.

  The weekends were his only reprieve, when he could lie on his bed in uninterrupted bliss, knowing the worst that would happen was the officer on duty would knock quietly on the door and ask if he was okay.

  Monday morning and the change of the guard was imminent. He’d forgone breakfast, sitting out in the living room staring at the fish tank. It was supposed
to be soothing but as time went on, he identified more and more with the fish. Trapped between four walls, circling and circling, with nothing but the occasional sprinkle of food, and the mammoth interruption of someone tapping the tank and sending them scurrying for cover.

  He had his back to the door when it opened to herald Morton’s return. He could feel the tension in his shoulders, his hands clenched, fingers digging into his palms as he waited for the taunting to start.

  “Drew?”

  He started at the voice, leaned around the chair to peer at the door.

  “S-Sam?”

  Had he lost it? Had his mind fractured and broken, and he was seeing things that weren’t there?

  “Hey. I, um. Hi.”

  He didn’t think a hallucinated Sam would be that tongue-tied.

  “You’re here. How are you here?”

  “They were short-staffed, I’m on loan from my team.”

  “You’re… you’re my protection detail?”

  “Temporarily, yeah.” Sam stepped closer. “How have you been?”

  It was too much, and he pulled back around into the chair, drawing his knees up and wrapping his arms around him. Sam, undeterred, grabbed the chair opposite him. “Drew?”

  “It’s good to see you,” he managed, staring at a spot on the floor.

  “You, too. The weekend officer was worried. He said you were really quiet. You barely ate.”

  “I haven’t been sleeping. And I guess my appetite’s not been the best.”

  “I thought maybe it was that guy, Morton. I met him last week for a handover. He’s a real charming piece of work.”

  Drew choked a laugh at that, horrified to find it morph into a sob. Leaning forward, he pressed his head against his knees, willing himself to pull it together.

  “Hey.” Sam was crouched next to him, a hand on knee. “Drew, come on, talk to me. Whatever it is.”

  He couldn’t, shaking his head hard enough to dislodge the tears from his eyes.

  Sam’s hand slipped under his chin, tipping his head up.