Chapter Thirty-Seven: June, 2002

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Aaron's going to kill me, Spencer had thought as the man shoved him to the ground.

This might actually kill me first, he'd realized moment later as the boot had fallen.

He'd fucked up. He'd fucked up so bad. After everything he'd done to ensure him taking Elle upstairs—behind the doors that normally cost a pretty penny to breach—was as overlooked as he could possibly make it, he'd fucked it all up. He hadn't put the book back. The ledger with Elliot Kyle's dirty money filtered through it, everything VU had done and would do and was doing. He hadn't put it back, and everyone was a suspect.

He was suspect #1.

They'd jumped him when he was walking from his home to meet Elle at work, summoned by an ambiguous text from her that just read work is strange today. Strange today meaning 'what the fuck did you do', and he'd been prepared for something, but not this.

Dirtied and bloodied with his new hair mussed and the tailored suit he'd spent his whole pay-cheque on, he might have gotten out of it by being smart and fast-mouthed. After being dragged back to the club and shoved into a room with Elliot and two men Spencer didn't know, he almost had them convinced of his innocence. He had Elliot anyway—the man was desperate to believe his pet genius wasn't a snitch and reaching for any evidence that suggested so. The other men didn't matter. They were muscle, nothing else, and so Spencer ignored them. He talked his way out of it with a tight feeling that maybe he was going to make it back to Aaron after all and not miss the funeral.

Then Elliot dismissed him with a snapped accusation at the one who'd kicked Spencer's cheek in—I said bring him in, not fuck him up! —and he walked out to find Elle slouching outside the office door with her arm held tight by Dent and her lip bloodied.

"It wasn't her," Spencer told Dent, as Dent shoved by and dragged her into the office. "I can promise you—it wasn't her. She's never up here without me. Dent!"

The door clicked shut. Spencer breathed in, once. Tugged his cell out and winced at the dozens of missed calls and texts. Aaron, hurt and frantic. Turning it off felt cruel, so Spencer shoved it back into his pocket on silent without answering any of them.

He could leave and still catch Aaron.

He couldn't leave.

He pulled his phone out again, slinking through the halls and downstairs into the employee bathroom, making sure at least three people saw him going in there. And he swallowed his pride and wrote out: I need your help. Elle's in danger. Do exactly as I say.

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"You're a fuckwit." Ethan's gaze was locked on him, Spencer could tell. It was burning into the back of his head, just as fiercely demanding as the ache in his knees. It was making it very hard to concentrate. "Spencer, what the fuck is going on?"

"Shh," Spencer hummed. In his slick hands, the long reach hook slipped and knocked the tumbler. "Concentrating." But it was impossible to focus when every thump could be Dent's footsteps coming towards them, when every noise could be Elle crying out for help.

"No one is coming." Ethan moved away slightly, towards the corner. "Hurry up." He was carrying the ledger in a backpack slung across his back, nondescript in his black uniform. Spencer took a moment to glance up at his friend, wincing at the thunderous expression he wore. Then, he wiped sweat from his eyes, readjusted the picks, and leaned closer to Dent's office door.

"This lock is crap, it's just a generic cheap-o rim cylinder," he mumbled to himself as he worked. They were running out of time before—he worked faster: "Can't be a Schlage because the plug retainer is a clip rather than a threaded cap, can't be a mortise cylinder as it has no cam—"

"Spencer," Ethan said suddenly. Downstairs, the steady thump of the music stalled. Spencer heard bangs. Shouts. Around the hall, he heard Elliot yell, his office door banging.

And under his hand, the lock slid open.

He grabbed the ledger as Ethan flung it to him and bolted in, taking only a heartbeat before sliding the heavy book under the man's filing cabinet. Out the door—he locked it behind him and turned with his heart wild and his eyes wilder—and Ethan grabbed his arm and hauled him in the opposite direction of the voices. They ran. Around the hall, down the stairs to the second floor, and slammed into Spencer's room with the door bouncing on its latch behind them.

And they stood there, neither facing the other, breathing heavily. "You need to go," Spencer babbled, turning on his heel. There was no window in here. But—outside, three doors down—a bathroom… "You need to go so Kyle doesn't think you had anything—"

"FBI, hands where we can see them!"

Too late.

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The eight and a half inches between him and Ethan felt like a cavernous space filled with all the air in the room. Spencer kicked his feet anxiously against the desk in front as Elle paced behind them. Ethan was silent. On the other side of the desk, Elle's handler was paging through the photocopied pages of the ledger. "After tonight, we have enough evidence that—with your testimonies—we stand a very good chance of taking them down, or at least Elliot Kyle's branch. There's absolutely no justification to continue your operation, Agent Greenaway. And, after tonight, there's no way I'm comfortable allowing it."

Ethan had winced at Agent Greenaway and was now staring at his knees with his cheeks flushing pink. Spencer watched him out of the corner of his vision, swallowing hard at the dangerously glassy glaze to them.

"You only say a chance, Jones, we need more than a chance! Elliot Kyle holds the key to dozens of our ongoing investigations—we fuck up taking him down, they're going to scatter and we've lost them all!" Elle whirled again, her eyes skating across Ethan and darting away as Spencer looked at her. "You took Dent in today with enough evidence to hold him and Kyle thinks he's the mole—there's no reason to pull me!"

"You're going to go back?" Ethan said suddenly, his voice rough and gaze snapping up to Elle's bloodied mouth. "After they questioned you?"

Elle didn't even flinch. "I'm a desperate woman," she replied coolly. "Kyle doesn't have anyone working for him that isn't desperate, isn't trapped. You don't think he deserves to be taken down, Coiro?"

Unsaid, it hovered in the room: you don't think Spencer needs him taken down?

"How fast can we get a resolution? With you and Reid in minimal danger?"

It was probably one of the braver things he'd done recently, speaking up in a room filled with angry people all ignoring him. But Spencer kicked his shoes against the carpet once more, coughed, and hoarsely managed: "Kyle is going to be covering his tracks after tonight. He'll be burying anything that makes him look shady, anything that will be seized when you return with a warrant driven by whatever he believes Dent is telling you. For that, he needs me… for that, he'll show me everything." When he looked up once more, finally meeting the gaze of the man across the desk, every eye was on him: "Give me a month. Please."

"A month," said Jones quietly. "You both have a month. I don't think I need to stress to you how much trouble this is going to cause, Greenaway, bringing another civilian into this."

"Ethan is—"

Ethan cut Elle off. "Not interested in being involved," he said monotonously. "With any of it."

Elle's soft intake of breath was both painfully quiet and far too loud, and every one of them heard it.

"Stay behind, Greenaway," Jones ordered, as Spencer and Ethan walked from the room.

She did.

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It was fear that made him keep his cell off until he was alone in his room, ready for whatever came his way. He sat on his mattress with his knees tucked up and one hand resting on the soft linen where Aaron would usually lie—usually, he assumed, because after this? Aaron was never going to forgive him—and his cell nestled in his palm. He poked at his blackened eye, wincing as it burned in response. In the apartment outside his room, there was complete silence. It was as though he was alone, despite knowing that Ethan was curled up in his own room with his anger and a bottle of whiskey. There was no light to break the gloom. No light seeped in through his shabby curtains or in from under the crack in the door.

It was night. He'd completely missed the funeral.

He'd left Aaron to face his father's body alone.

"Fuck," Spencer breathed, and lifted his hand from the bed to press between his eyes, gasping as the bruising socket throbbed and sent splinters of pain stabbing into his head. Blinking back tears, he jabbed the on button and stared at the watery gleam of the screen as it powered up and began buzzing endlessly in his hand. Buzz buzz buzz buzz buzz and he winced with every hum. The messages he'd ignored as he'd messaged Ethan to bring the ledger and the calls he'd rejected as he'd frantically worked to convince Elle's handler to go along with his plan in convincing Elliot that Dent was the crooked one.

There were more now. Spencer swallowed, and opened the latest. And then the next.

And the next.

From: Aaron

where r u? how many times hav i kept u frm shooting up

i always help u and u dont give a shit about me

Those were the kinds ones. They preceded panic, sure, and they preceded him bolting out into Ethan's room and battering on the closed door until Ethan answered, his face a storm-cloud and his fists bunched.

"I need to go to Aaron," Spencer rambled.

That preceded discovering that Aaron was gone. That Sean was alone and scared for his brother at Aaron's apartment. That Sean was bleeding and not entirely sure whose blood it was, that Aaron wasn't answering his phone, that he could be anywhere and in any condition and, if he was half as drunk as Sean was, far too drunk to be alone. Spencer called and he called and he called and got voicemail every time.

And then the texts turned cruel.

you think normal people would put up with this shit?

what makes you any different from HIM you always LEAVE just like before

when we were kids

I needed you then and I needed you NOW and ur all i can think about but im always NOTHING to YOU

but ill just keep fucking putting up with your shit just like ethan ands it more than you deserve

Finally, they turned crushing. Spencer stared down at the screen of his phone as the streets whipped by outside the window of Ethan's car against his cheek. The cell gleamed accusingly, the words damning.

i wish i could hate you like i hate loving you

"Spencer," Ethan snapped, not the first time he'd said it. "Where else would he go?"

Spencer couldn't think. Couldn't think to panic. To reply. To—

The phone vanished from his limp hand, Ethan glancing at the screen before hissing something indiscernible. "You were cruel too," he said finally, his voice soft, "when you were high and didn't want anyone to find you. But you never meant any of it."

"What if something happens?" Spencer managed. "What if we don't…"

Ethan was quiet. In his pocket, his own cell hummed, his fingers dancing on the fabric as he stared up at the traffic lights. "And now you know how I felt every time I did this for you."

Ouch.

It was true.

It was damning.

"I'm sorry," Spencer breathed, too little too late.

Ethan ignored his apology, instead pulling the car over after the lights and answering his cell with a sharp snap to his voice that resonated in the interior of his car. Spencer toed at the fast food wrappers on the floor with his heart in his mouth and his gut twisting tight.

And then Ethan's voice turned cool, turned hurt, and he said, "Why should I trust you this time? You've been lying to me for months. You've never not lied to me…" A voice like shattering.

Spencer closed his eyes and didn't look. Elle. The look on Ethan's face at the words Agent Greenaway said more than anything which of them wouldn't be escaping this night unscarred. And, somewhere in the midnight city around them, Aaron was drowning too. Not Spencer, who'd lied, nor Elle, who'd made a career of it, but the men who'd dared to love them and gotten stung for their troubles.

He tried to call Aaron. Straight to voicemail. Ethan hung up with a quiet okay and they sat in silence for a moment.

"Simon called Elle," Ethan said finally. Spencer was silent, but his pulse bounded a moment at the thought of the agent's help at finding Aaron before… well, before anything. "She's with them now. Wants us to meet them, says she can… help."

He didn't sound convinced.

"She has resources we don't…" Spencer said eventually, hating himself but seeing no choice. "We need her."

Ethan shot him an incredulous look, but put the car into drive. They drove in silence, with everything they'd feared filling the space between them.

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That night didn't stop spiralling into horror. They'd met up with Elle and Ethan had silently waited for Spencer to sprint from the car and then driven away without a word, leaving them standing staring uselessly after his car. Spencer and Simon had pretended they couldn't see the tears Elle was furiously holding back, or hear the way her voice had wavered as she'd asked a friend to help track Aaron's cell.

They'd found Aaron, and Spencer's nightmares would become flavoured with the sight of his boyfriend wavering against the railing of a bridge from then on.

Spencer had gotten him to bed. "M'sorry I told you to fuck off," Aaron had mumbled drunkenly, his breath and his sweaty-soiled skin striking deep into something repressed deep in Spencer's twisting gut and making even being in the same room as him an exercise in panic-reduction.

"It's okay," Spencer said quietly, and assumed that Aaron couldn't remember the other texts. A search of his boyfriend's discarded clothes on the bedroom floor, stinking of vomit and sweat and blood and dirt, found no cell for Spencer to delete the texts before Aaron could be reminded. Tossing the clothes into the bathroom hamper as a 'later' problem, Spencer swallowed down the i wish i could hate you like i hate loving you into somewhere deep and hidden alongside the choking panic and knew he would be the ruin of the broken man in front of him. The one who kept waking up from an alcohol-soaked sleep and babbling about Spencer, about his brother, about his father, about everything he'd pulled tight and kept hidden.

I'm nothing to you, his text had screamed at Spencer, and so Spencer kept his distance and watched from Aaron's desk, wishing he knew the words to fix this, to make it different. To twist his life back on the right track, with Aaron and his studies his first priority instead of drugs and panic and undercover operations that Aaron would never find out about.

A soft knock on the door precluded Sean edging in, his eyes wide on his own grimy face and coated in the same slick-sour scent of alcohol. Spencer closed his eyes and pushed it down, everything he knew was going to one day overwhelm him.

"He okay?" Sean asked, and Spencer nodded.

"You okay?" Sean asked, and Spencer pushed harder. "He can get mean when drunk but he doesn't mean it, not like… not like dad. Before you got him out, before you told me how bad it was. I didn't realize, you know. Didn't think he'd be this fucked up about him…"

"I didn't help him," Spencer said blankly. He remembered, as through it was some distant dream, the summer Aaron's arm was broken. It was a strange, sunken memory, like something he had to struggle to recollect, on the other side of the week that had killed him and left behind the sour man he was now. "I knew he was a victim of child abuse from the first summer I met him. I did nothing for years."

And in that distant, gloomy memory, he remembered a patchwork of bruises across a child's back and sides and imagined himself as a man grown watching a dark-haired boy walk slowly home. Alone.

Standing aside and doing nothing.

"What?" Sean said. "Spencer, you were a kid, dude. You didn't—"

"I abandoned him then and I'll do it again," Spencer mumbled and crumpled, and curled on the desk with paper sticking damply to his cheek. Aaron snorted in his sleep, jerking upright with wide eyes and dangerously cow-licked hair, the blanket sliding down his bare chest to pool, thankfully, across his naked lap.

"What?" Aaron slurred, blinking, staring at Sean. "Sean, geddout of my room. Where's Spence?"

"Pouting at your desk," Sean answered.

Dead and gone, Spencer thought. You're better off without him. If I was kind, I'd show you that.

But Spencer hadn't been kind for a long time, and he was far too weak to start now.

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Lies followed. Lies about that night, about Spencer's black eye, about his work. Lies about the texts. Lies about the state of their hearts. Spencer became a liar in everything because to tell even one truth would be to bare parts of himself he couldn't let Aaron see.

The fighting hurt. Every fight tore something integral inside Spencer, some small part of him that still knew the name of a beetle stumbling across a homemade fort. Every fight shattered those rose-tinged glasses just a little more until Spencer was too tired to even struggle to remember those Halcyon days.

He returned to work. There were eyes on him everywhere. They all watched him, no one trusted him. His books were checked twice and everything he done examined. He didn't dare go near Elle. He couldn't go near Ethan. He was isolated to the second floor with everyone around him suspicious.

Ethan refused to speak to him. Their home became silent. No music, no talking, just the muffled shuffle of footsteps as they danced around each other and tried to make sure they were never in the same room at the one time. Spencer began to sleep a lot.

His coursework suffered. His research failed, twice. Non-replicable data. If it happened again, he'd lose his funding.

Simon hated him for hurting Aaron. Kate hated him for continuing to hurt Aaron. Elle hated him because he represented everything she'd done for her job, everything that had become the knife to slice Ethan from her life. Ethan hated him because he should.

Aaron didn't hate him, but Spencer almost wished he would.

Summer crept on, and Spencer had never been so alone.