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Neil was in their rooms because the weather was miserable and because this was where Kevin and Andrew would know where to find him. He had his phone on for once, but he wasn’t expecting it to go off. They’d drive here as soon as they landed, and he’d know when they came through the door. Nicky was sprawled on their floor, similarly driven indoors by the weather and camping on Neil’s carpet with his homework in a blatant attempt to avoid the freshmen. He was effectively distracting Neil from his thoughts by chattering about everybody and anybody they’d ever met as he riffled through library books and Neil played his part by tuning out a good half of it. Nicky didn’t mind. He had long since established his role as the one who would talk when nobody else would, and he probably could tell Neil wasn’t paying attention even if he’d be slightly wrong about why.
Aaron and Kaitlyn were still together, and that was all Neil wanted to know about them. The freshmen were annoying, Neil didn’t want to think about the freshmen but he wanted to think about Jean Kevin and Andrew less.
"He'll be fine you know-" Neil only tuned in because Nicky switched topics halfway through his sentence. Neil glanced over and was unnerved to find his teammate looking at him seriously for once. "Jean," he clarified in a moment of unfortunately timed shrewdness "The Ravens are dropping like flies but Jean's a cardinal now." He looked almost pleased with himself for this rather stupid comparison. "Honestly, the interview wasn’t - okay the interview was a fucking mess but look on the bright side you’ve had way worse interviews last year" He gave a halfhearted grin at Neils undoubtedly unimpressed expression.
He was right. Neil hoped. He said nothing. He glanced at his phone. It was still silent.
Nicky watched him for a moment before sighing and going back to the papers he’d strewn in a haphazard circle around himself. He might have picked up again - one topic or another but the door opened before he could find his place.
Kevin burst through in a familiar front of bad attitude, ignoring Nickys squawk as he scrambled to avoid being trampled. He was already jabbing a finger at Neil before he pulled up across the counter "C'etait là? Vraiment? Où t'es allé il y a un mois?" He raised his voice "Tu lui as - tuer?" It went nearly breathless on the last word. Neil almost wondered for a moment who Grayson had been to Kevin too – but dismissed the suspicion as quickly as it arose. Riko would never have let anybody else touch Kevin. That was a sick sort of relief and Neil pushed thoughts of the ravens bloody nest from his mind before he could think of Kevin there alongside Jean.
He avoided saying a name, Neil noticed. Switching languages didn’t help much to disguise names, which meant he was deliberately excluding Andrew.
Neil briefly ignored Kevin to stare past him at the door. Andrew followed him, unemotional as he leaned against the door and locked it. Unemotional except for the gaze he fixed on Neil. His drawl was cool, “Aaron wasn't enough now he's wanting to try the trial thing for himself."
Nicky let out a startled, strangled question, staring up between Andrew Neil and then Kevin, but Neil didn’t miss the look their resident former Raven either. Neil thought Kevin had no right to look so shocked. He'd known they would both come at him about this, he'd only wondered if they’d do it separately or together. And in the month he’d had to prepare Neil had come up with nothing convincing for either.
He suddenly wished vehemently that it had been separately. He needed to speak to Andrew first – there were things which couldn’t be said here-
Andrew continued before anyone recovered, still a bored drone "Neil, avenger of all unfortunate, is that it?" He pushed off the wall and walked up beside Kevin. He did not take his eyes from Neil's. Neil didn’t take his from Andrew. There was just the slightest edge when he pressed " Jean said you didn’t kill him yourself."
Kevin’s flinch was violent. Nicky reacted with another dismayed moan. Neil opened his mouth but the cousin was already scrambling to his feet "Yep! Yep yep, Leaving! Going to go bother Matt. Loud and clear, do NOT let me come back till y’all are done." The door locked behind him and silence fell.
"Yes" said Neil "I was meeting Stewart."
"We knew that." Andrew waited. Kevin looked between them, pissed, a look which turned downright ugly when Andrew switched to German without lifting his eyes from Neil "You lied to me"
There it was. Looking for it didn’t make anything easier. Knowing this had to happen first just made his heart jump into his throat. The words - insufficient but ready - crowded to his lips "I didn’t lie"
"Bullshit. Your rules lawyering isn’t cute, especially when its this blatant."
"I said I was meeting my uncle, and you knew what that meant."
"What.” The pit in dark eyes grew deeper. Neil was drowning in it, “Not where. Try again."
Neil took a breath and said quickly "Jeans family. It was quick and messy we didn’t have time to talk it out. Steward and I had to fly out and get Jean before somebody else go to us first – we couldn’t tell anybody before the news broke."
"I am not. Anybody"
Neil stopped fiddling with his phone and straightened, he didn’t let his eyes drop "You are to me." Andrew stared so he doubled down "You are. To me. Jean asked if Ichiro knew about you - he implied I should try to hide you. I said I’m sure he did - the FBI definitely knows. The team is what’s keeping me in line, they know that, its why they let me –“ he didn’t let Andrew look away from him, he didn’t let himself look away from Andrew “Neil Josten exist. You, especially, are a liability.”
Andrew hardly looked anything but bored, but Neil knew better. He pressed on “You told me not to run. I trusted you, I stayed here for you.” He didn’t let Andrew look away – he didn’t know if he would, or if Andrew was as fixed on him as he was on Andrew “I trusted you. I do trust you, I will continue to trust you. Running isn’t an option anymore – everyone in the world knows who I am. And everyone who matters knows who you are to me. I am going to continue being Neil Josten and I will take all that attention if it means that I can use it to keep my people safe. As long as I am useful, you are useful for keeping me put.” He stopped to take a breath, the truth was not comfortable or easy. He had not rehearsed any good way to say this so it all came out a mess. “But I won’t let them think you know Ichiro’s secrets. That’s what this trip was about – Jean and I need to make sure his family can fall without anybody else being implicated.” Neil stressed “Anybody. We’ve even cut Kevin out of it, he couldn’t know anything at all. Nobody can think for a moment that you know or care anything about the Moriyamass or the Moreaus or the Wysinskis.”
Neil’s hand twitched. He wanted to approach Andrew – he wanted to have this conversation in private but Kevin was between them with his arms crossed, impatiently waiting out their drama. He couldn’t send Kevin away and he couldn’t leave because this conversation was far from over. As much as he didn’t want to have the rest, he had to, and Kevin deserved that much. Instead he finished in German, “I won’t let them fucking touch you. I don’t care if you don’t want to be protected – I said before that somebody had to do it and for as long as you have my back I’m going to have yours. I won’t lie to you again, but I’m never letting the Moryiamas or the FBI or anybody else think they own you too.”
Andrew met this speech with silence and an unblinking stare. Kevin grit his teeth and Neil’s heartbeat was all he could hear for far too long.
At last Andrew’s intensity faded to boredom, “Jean,” he said. “Grayson.”
Neil let out a harsh breath – it was a demand for an explanation but it wasn’t anger. It wasn’t betrayal anymore. Relief of Andrews forgiveness was its own spike of exhausted trepidation. He hadn’t lost Andrew. This hadn’t been too much of a lie. He wasn’t looking forward to the rest of this conversation but it could be done – Andrew was still here.
Neil eased back into English and tried at the truth - it was still difficult. Easier with Andrew than anybody else, "I asked him to do it. Or more accurately if he had any contacts. It was quick, that’s not why I was there"
Andrew's low chuckle was as dark as his stare "Of course. Its a tight schedule between the mafia and the FBI, but you managed to squeeze in a hit on a man you barely knew"
Kevin choked. Neil finally looked at him. He did not look good. Kevin had fewer panic attacks these days, but any mention of the Ravens was a slippery slope to a spiral. "Jean- "
Neil shook his head "Jean didn’t get a say. I only told him later"
Kevin's intake of breath was sharp and rattling. He looked towards the fridge, towards the stash of alcohol they had cluttering up the bottom shelf. He hardly managed more than a whisper "Jean didn’t - he told you?"
Neil hesitated. Andrews locked onto him with new intensity. Neil avoided it by looking at Kevin. He hedged "It wasn’t difficult to put together. I showed up the same day Grayson attacked him. I didn’t need the details"
Kevin scrambled for breath again before fleeing for the fridge and a bottle. Neil sidestepped him.
"Neil" Andrew had circled the counter to stand next to Neil. He could feel the weight and heat of his partner’s body. The unfailing steady center which always brought him back when he strayed too far. An anchor for Neil, for his family. He was demanding answers Neil didn’t want to give, but still he took a deep breath. His heart calmed the tiniest bit, he pulled new strength from Andrew.
Neil did not want to look at Andrew. He looked at Andrew.
Andrew looked at him.
"It wont be traced back to me." But that was only part of the problem.
In German Andrew intoned "The bite marks."
"I asked."
"And he said."
Neil hesitated. He glanced at Kevin - at the glass he was refilling, and downing just as quickly. Kevin had started this in French, a failed attempt to be private. Born of pride, anxiety, or an awkward attempt to shield Andrew Neil couldn’t guess Kevin’s internal world, but at the same time he knew it was all of them. Andrew did not want to be shielded, but Neil didn’t want to remind himself that the whole world knew the every detail of Andrews private trauma any more than he wanted to remind his partner-
He quit stalling. Neil looked to Andrew, his German so low only the two of them could hear as he reluctantly quoted "'I guess Drake wasn’t a biter then'"
Andrew went still. Neil knew better than to touch him but he looked down when he felt the firm hold on his own wrist, and his heart skipped then calmed. Andrew did not like being protected, Andrew did not need to be protected, but even now he was the rock at the center of Neil’s world.
They stood like that for a moment before Andrew finally said "He said Grayson didn’t touch you."
Neil shook his head. "I don’t remember but I know he didn’t. I belonged to Riko and Jean - kept me away from the rest."
Andrew nodded. Neil looked down to see him trace a finger down his arm bands, the ones which matched his own. Andrew stopped but did not let go of his wrist.
"Why didn’t Jean kill himself?"
It nearly took Neil’s breath away. His thoughts picked up again - Jeans own dissociation. His stoicism his anger his unfailing unflagging endurance. Pushing himself through the nest for three years. Seven years of hell – with Kevin at his side, urging him on but too far away to reach his hand. Pulling Neil along with him in December so neither could drown in black walls and their own blood. Being left behind by Kevin. Left behind by Neil – until Renee stormed the impenetrable walls of the nest and hauled him free. One woman and her unflagging determination for a better kinder world the rest of them forgot how to believe in long ago.
Jean broken and angry in Abby’s house. Jean leaving their rooms a bloody frozen wreck after Riko’s death. Jean in the sunshine capital of the world surrounded by kind strong unflagging support and joy, still a shadow. Haunted pale bruised and bitten, a wretched thing hauled from its cave into the light of day. Jean loosing himself over a sister he could hardly remember in an unforgiving vinyl booth with only the cold, hard comfort of a runaway who’s closest family was an estranged gangster.
Jean insisting again and again that he was nothing and he deserved worse.
Neil had been tortured hunted beaten and used but he had never hit rock bottom. He had never been alone, not like that. He looked at Andrew "I don’t know." He didn’t say why didn’t you.
Andrew met his gaze, then he looked at Kevin and Neil’s eyes followed. Kevin almost wasn’t visibly shaking. He was slowly putting the cap back on the bottle and pushing it away.
Andrew said "The golden boy is afraid."
Neils thoughts were not even close to the ballpark where this made sense "What?"
Andrew, predictably, did not respond. Neil mulled this over as they looked across the room. Jeremy Knox, probably. Neil knew nothing about him, brilliant striker but he still mistrusted bright smiles on principle. Nicky once joked he could be Renee’s lost twin – Neil hoped so. Jean needed Renee, he needed a thousand Renee’s to get him out of the nest and keep him in the sun. It was the Trojan’s job to smother Jean with love and protection friendship and kindness. It was Kevin’s job to hand him to their safekeeping. It was Neil’s to make sure that the darker parts of their world disappeared in silence and never again marred his chance for a future.
Neil had delivered Jean back to those fierce smiles told him to lock the door. He had promised that by the time the sun rose again another monster would be dead, and he was. Neil had to trust the rest to the captain of the sunshine court – he trusted him because Kevin trusted him but that didn’t mean Neil knew what to do with his smiles.
Neil thought of a time a year before, when he'd wondered if Wymack could read misery in his recruits the way Neil could read anger. He thought of himself, Kevin. Aaron. It was not a surprise that Andrew could smell fear like a bloodhound, and it always drew him in. Andrew scolding Neil for overzealous defense of Jean was ridiculous. The whole world knew the foxes goalkeeper was as obsessively protective as they come.
"Afraid of what?"
Andrew shrugged, "His brother, his past. The way Kevin might hurt Jean. The way Jean might hurt Kevin. Probably more."
Kevin looked up at his name even if he couldn’t understand the language. He steadied himself on the counter, distinctly nonplussed to find them both staring at him like a particularly interesting bug.
He glanced between them "What"
"Nothing" said Neil.
Andrew just released Neil's arm and said in English "The FBI"
Neil retorted "What about them?"
Kevin fell to the new topic of hounding Neil with ease "Don’t fucking what about them- us. You of all people can not be trusted you are a misadventuring child who gets kidnapped like it’s a hobby. Riko –“ he began to list slightly louder when Niel made a face – “Your father, Ichiro, the fucking FBI. We can not afford to loose you. Again. You are vice captain, this team needs you. Last year was a fluke, the death spiral of Edgar Allen means nothing for our chances, our seconds are useless. Do not ever leave the state without telling us again. Do not ever meet with your uncle unless its absolutely necessary. Do not distract yourself with Jean, he is the Trojans’ responsibility-“ he paused with a glare to see if any of it was taking. Unimpressed with Neil’s response he laid back in with abandon “Do not fucking get us involved in another murder trial, Neil.” He jabbed a finger at Andrew, still riding Neil for all it was worth “If you are in danger you let Andrew handle it. If anything else is a problem you call Wymack and you let Wymack handle it.”
Andrew’s expression didn’t change but a twitch indicated something like amusement. Neil considered telling Kevin that Jean actually had called Wymack and Neil had hung up on him. Kevin’s unfailing belief that his father would solve all the problems which didn’t require Andrew had apparently been strong enough to rub off on Jean in his shattered state. Neil found that interesting, but he did not share their conviction. Wymack could not hold his kids together if he did not follow certain rules. Rules that Neil did not feel particularly beholden to. Rules that people like Ichiro and Stewart found mild nuisances at best.
Neil shrugged.
Kevin glowered then spun on Andrew to back him up. Andrew just raised both hands in a gesture of disinterest and turned away to kick through Nicky’s abandoned homework. Kevin hissed at him in rebuke and whirled back on Neil. “Neil!”
“Sure,” Neil said, “Now that this is out it’s Jean’s problem.”
That brought an entirely different sort of scowl to Kevin’s face. With a groan he slumped against the counter and fumbled for his handle again, mumbling sourly, “I’m never doing another interview again. Neither of you should be allowed within a mile of a camera.”
Neil just smiled at him.
Kevin’s suspicious glance said he wasn’t any more immune to Neil’s inherited smile than anyone else. “What story did you come up with, anyway?”
Neil told them. Kevin sighed and went back to drinking but Andrew gave him a long slow look.
"That is an exceedingly stupid story" Entertained or disappointed, Neil assumed both.
He was coming to the same conclusion. He sighed, “We were a bit distracted,” was all he could say in their defense.