Among the Flames and Ashes
by Sandrine Shaw
Briggs catches up with him on the stairs when Mike comes home, another night when he's late enough to miss dinner, giving a pass to tense companionship and forced chit-chat.
He's halfway up to his room already when Briggs' voice travels through the dark corridor. "You ever gonna talk to me again, Mikey?"
They haven't had a proper conversation since Mike signed off on the report, perjuring himself for what may or may not be the greater good. Since Briggs came home with Ari's blood on his hands, and Jakes took off with nine million dollars and left them all behind.
Mike swallows and walks on without turning. "Why? What's left to say?"
He walks past Jakes' door on his left, forcing himself not to slow down. Not to steal a furtive glance at the empty room that's been taunting them. Just the other day, he found Johnny standing in the doorway with his eyes fixed on the neatly made bed and the empty shelves. When Mike put a hand on his shoulder, it was shaken off with a viciousness that made the comforting words catch in his throat, choking him.
There's enough blame between them all to light a bonfire. Mike blames Briggs, and Charlie blames the both of them, and Paige blames Jakes, and Johnny blames everyone but Mike most of all. Briggs... Hell knows what Briggs thinks. Briggs lives in this world where the ends justify whatever means necessary, and Mike's tired of his half-arsed excuses and justifications.
He slips into his room, ready to close the door behind himself and shut Briggs out. But Briggs is faster, his foot already in the door, and then he's pushing past. He crosses his arms over his chest and frowns at Mike, looking too damn righteous for his own good.
"So, what, you're gonna be mad at me forever?"
Mike's rage flares up like a flash fire, white-hot and all-consuming. "I'm not fucking mad. You're making it sound like it slipped your mind that it was your turn with the chores wheel and the rest of us are sulking over it. Do you even understand the gravity of what you've done? You lied to every single one of us. You falsified evidence. You got Colby tortured and killed. You shot at least two unarmed people in cold blood – two that I know of, God knows how many others there are – and then you got us all involved in the cover-up. You broke our trust in every fucking way imaginable. It's your fault that Jakes took that money and ran, and we all know it." He says us and our instead of me and mine, and he means it: Briggs actions had consequences for all of them; he all but brought the house down with his secrets and his deception. But the truth is that his betrayal feels painfully personal to Mike.
Briggs has the nerve to roll his eyes.
It's not like Mike genuinely expected him to be uncomfortable or – God forbid – contrite when faced with his actions, but the sheer nonchalance with which he reacts to the litany of accusations makes Mike's blood boil. "I did what had to be done, and when I lied about it was to protect you and the others from it. And don't act like I'm the only liar in this house. None of us is a saint. They sent you here to investigate me and I still trusted you afterwards."
"Bullshit. All you did was play me and manipulate me. If you'd ever trusted me, you wouldn't have sent me on a wild goose chase with the Sarin gas. You'd have come clean about Juan and Odin and that whole fucking mess. You wouldn't have set me up to have me killed at the fucking bank job." He punches his fist into the wall next to Briggs' head, pleased to watch him flinch. The pain of the impact travels from his knuckles up to his shoulder like an electric shock, and Mike welcomes it because unlike the tight coil of rage curling inside of him, it's a tangible thing. "So don't fucking talk to me about trust, man. Because I'm not buying whatever you're selling anymore."
Briggs is watching him through narrowed eyes, like he's trying to get a better read on him, like he wants to crawl inside of Mike's mind and figure out what makes him tick. The intensity of his stare is unnerving Mike, and it's all he can do not to turn away. "Figured it all out, have you? Which begs the question, why are you still here? Or better maybe — why am I still here?"
Mike snorts. "Don't fucking tempt me."
This conversation isn't going anywhere, Briggs is already trying to turn the tables on him, and Mike has no intention of justifying his choices.
He's about to walk away – out of his own damn room if necessary, just to get away – when Briggs' hands settle on his hips, holding him in place. Large, warm palms steady against the waistband of his jeans, and Briggs' thumb finds that slip of bare skin above his belt where his shirt rides up, drawing tiny circles. The sensation sends shivers up Mike's spine. It feels so good, even when the audacity of Briggs using that sort of intimacy against him makes Mike's stomach turn.
"Mike," Briggs says, using that tone – the one that says 'I'm your friend' and 'you can trust me', and Mike's hands clench into fists. "I want to bring Jakes back before we have to call it in. I want to fix this, but I need your help. I have a plan."
Of course Briggs has a plan. Briggs always has a plan, and all his plans inevitably end up with blood on their hands and collateral damage piling up.
"The kind of plan where you cross all kinds of lines and make us all dance to your tune without telling us what's going on until it's too late?"
"No. No more lies. No more secrets."
It's bullshit. It's another one-man show of Briggs, the mastermind manipulator, making empty promises and offers he has no intention of following through. Mike knows him well enough to see through him – to understand that the sincerity of Briggs' smile, the warmth of his hands seeping through Mike's clothing, the imploring honesty in his gaze, they're all lies. And damn him, because Mike desperately wants to believe them, wants Briggs to take him on another wild joy-ride even when he knows it'll leave him broken beyond repair.
Fuck this. Fuck everything. He's already sold his soul, and that glass house he's sitting in is eventually going to come down on him and bury him no matter what, so what's one more crack in the ceiling?
He clenches his fist in Briggs' shirt, tight until his knuckles are white and the soft fabric tears, and he pulls him in. Clashes their lips together, harsh and without finesse. The kiss is all teeth and tongue, more violent than Mike's fist when he threw a punch at Briggs the other week, and the burn of Briggs' beard is like sandpaper against his skin.
Briggs' eyes blaze when Mike pushes him back, putting inches of distance between them without letting go of Briggs' shirt. There's a new kind of appreciation in that gaze, and there's a part of Mike – the same part who hasn't stopped wanting Briggs' approval, despite everything – that revels in it.
"Are you sealing the pact or was that a Judas kiss, Michael?"
"Neither." Mike shakes his head. "I told you, I don't buy what you're selling anymore. You want me to help you track Jakes down? Fine, let's do it. But no more promises that we both know you're not going to keep. And the next time you fuck me over? I'm not going to report you. I'm not going to punch you in the face and give you a smack talk. I'm going to fucking put you down."
The threat doesn't seem to faze Briggs. If anything, it seems to excite him. He reaches up and trails Mike's kiss-bruised lips with his fingers, pressing down until Mike opens them and then slipping inside, letting his thumb catch on Mike's incisors. "You've grown teeth. I like it."
Mike remembers being fresh out of Quantico and thinking this assignment would send him on a fast-track to D.C. Two years on, he's a recovering drug-addict who's covered up more crimes than he's stopped, and he swapped his illusions and all those lofty aspirations for scars and bitterness. The fresh-faced kid he was wouldn't recognize this person he's become, would hate him on sight and balk at how thoroughly he's allowed this house and this job and Briggs to shake up his morals. But this is a one-way street and there's no going back. He burned that kid to ashes when he put Lena's body in the incinerator.
Under Briggs' curious gaze, he finds himself growing more comfortable with who he's become. To run with the wolves, you have to become a wolf yourself, or else they'll tear you apart. And he's not going to let Briggs and his schemes and his lies tear him apart, not if he can help it. He won't let Briggs control everything and wrap Mike around his finger like he did with Charlie.
Mike bites down, not as hard as he could – Briggs isn't losing a finger – but it's enough to make him bleed. "Yeah? Good. Because I'm fucking done playing nice."
He crowds Briggs against the wall and leans in, bringing their bodies together – close enough to feel Briggs' sharp exhale as a gust of breath against his face and Briggs' hard-on digging into his hip. For a moment, he allows himself to linger, just long enough to make it count.
With a small smile, he breaks away and steps back, trying not to let on how much of an effort it costs not to play this out, to take Briggs apart with his hands and his mouth, to find out what it feels like to have the man's scary intensity focused fully on him, to sink down on Briggs' cock and drown out all the anger and resentment.
"So, tell me about the plan," he says instead, all business.
The hand that's still resting on Mike's waist briefly clenches before it falls away. He'll have finger-shaped bruises there tomorrow. He likes the idea that Briggs is brimming with frustration right now. It must be driving him insane that this time he's not the one pulling the strings.
But when Mike sits down on the bed and looks up, the shadow of a smile on Briggs' face gives him pause. It's the kind of smile that says 'I got you right where I want you'.
"I'm glad you're on board," Briggs says, and reaches out to squeeze his shoulder, and Mike can't shake the sinking feeling that he's been playing right into Briggs' hands after all.
End