There they were. His big, warm, strong hands. Liam cupped mine in his and pulled me closer and closer until we were… hugging. Which was nice, but not quite what I had expected. I had expected us to engage in something a bit more… romantic, now that we were finally free to do so without being interrupted.

"Liam?" My voice was just a whisper, but I was sure Liam would understand the question. Still, his only response was to squeeze me tighter. I was about to restructure my question into something a bit more specific when I realized something was definitely wrong. I didn't need to ask. Liam was shaking.

"Hey, what's wrong?" Fear spiked through me, sharp and unexpectedly unexpected. I'd finally accomplished my goal of forgetting the terror that had been a constant in my life for the past seven years, but suddenly I was wondering if that had been a mistake. "Liam, please! What happened?"

He drew a ragged breath. "C-Cole died." Liam stuttered. Liam, who's always to sure of his words. Liam, who always holds himself together when everyone else is falling apart. Liam, whose brother died before his eyes, before he could even register what was happening. The relief I felt at the realization that no new threat had arisen – yet – was very real, brief, and shameful. Because Liam was about to break. He continued. "And I- I just w-watched. Y-you you know what I s-said to him just b-before we went in the-there?"

"Shhh," I rubbed circles on his back and tried to calm Liam – and myself – down. I couldn't believe I'd already forgotten that Liam had to deal with Cole's death. I'd somehow managed to forget that it would destroy him, even though at some point, before the world was righted and happy and bright, I'd known it would.

"I t-told him he wasn't… he wasn't w-worthy of being c-called a R-Red b-because he hadn't s-suffered with us." It was so incredibly hard for Liam to speak that it hurt to even listen. "I c-considered what y-you said about b-being accepted but then I thought about-about J-Jude a-and about a-all Zu's been through a-and I was so, s-so angry. W-why-" Finally Liam collapsed to the ground heaving great, rattling gasps of air but seeming to never get enough. I went down with him and stroked his back, his hair, his face, in a vain effort to calm him.

"Shhh, Liam, lisiten to me. Take slow breaths." For all the times he'd shoved his way past my barriers of guilt and fear, I felt helpless against the walls Liam built around himself.

"C-can't b-breath," he stuttered out.

"Okay, okay, calm down." I couldn't tell if I was talking to Liam or myself. He was freaking hyperventilating. Is this why he'd brought us out into the middle of nowhere? So he could have a panic attack with nobody remotely familiar with how to deal with it around? Not even Chubs was anywhere near us.

"Liam, please." I wondered if he could hear the tremor in my voice as clearly as I could. "You can't blame yourself. There's no way Cole would care about you saying that – he wouldn't have blamed you in a million years. You're- you're all he ever cared about, did you know that?" I can't tell if it's working, but Liam needs to know this anyway, so I continue.

"He never acted like it when you were around, but maybe that's what older brothers are supposed to do." Suddenly I remembered something. "And that's how he was raised. I never even told Cole this happened, but… I accidentally got pulled into his mind once. He was thinking about when you guys were little. When you still lived with your father. That scar he had, Liam, he got that protecting you."

Liam's breathing was finally returning to normal, but he was still shaking, so I kept talking. I kept remembering. "And then there was that time when you dislocated your shoulder in that car crash. Except he thought that you died. He made this crazy noise and then – well, remember how he said he shot the gas tank? Yeah, that didn't happen. He lost his head when he realized you were in danger, forgot his ability was supposed to be a secret, and set the car on fire."

"Lying bastard," Liam muttered darkly. But there was a ghost of a smile on his face.

"Lee… Cole really loved you. More than anything else in the world. He didn't want you to love him. He was just like me when you first found me, except more stubborn. Probably smarter, at least when it came to protecting you."

"He was so stupid, though. I wish he'd trusted me from the start." Liam's eyes darkened. "Although, I guess considering the way I treated him after he told me demonstrates that he was right in not trusting me."

"No – no, Liam, don't say that. That wasn't it at all. He beat himself up with worse words than you could ever come up with… The fact that you were willing to go with him, just the two of you, on that Op, that meant the world to him. He wouldn't have dreamed that you would go near him after finding out he was a Red." The pain in Liam's eyes hadn't eased. My words were no longer getting through to him. I took his hand, wishing with all my might that I could make him understand, that I could make him feel the love Cole felt towards him for himself.

And suddenly it was flowing through me. The warm, all encompassing and unconditional love that had flowed into me the day I'd intruded on Cole's mind but was always directed towards Liam was doing exactly what I'd wanted. It was reaching Liam.

When it stopped, Liam's face was wet with new tears, but his eyes were bright with understanding. It was the first moment I'd truly loved my powers. Liam leaned into me.

"Thank you," he said, burying his face in my neck, stroking my hair, pulling me closer to him. "Thank you so much, darlin'. I love you."

"I love you, too," I whispered.