Only Cowards Stay While Traitors Run
When Last We Met: After chasing DG to the Other Side, Cain finally learns the reason behind her leaving, the truth given to her by the powerful Glinneth, and he knows that convincing her to return to the O.Z. - his only hope of going home - will not be as simple or easy as it is in the stories.
Chapter Thirty Nine: Liars, Ghosts, and Thieves
Cain awoke to warmth, and peace, and morning light.
DG was asleep beside him, his arm pinned beneath her head, her pretty face delicate and still in slumber.
The night before came back to him in fits and flashes. In his arms, DG sighed, shifted, and slept on.
Gentle and slow, he lifted his head from the pillow so that he might get a better look at her. It was rare that he saw her calm like this. Vulnerable, almost, in some strange small way. It was enough to put a smile on his face, and though he knew the moment would come and go, he hoped there'd be more like it.
Her lips parted and she sighed again in her sleep. His body stirred with all sorts of imaginings involving that little mouth. But then wasn't the time. As much as he wanted her, he wasn't about to let desire take over. He'd crossed over a line and knew it, one that was marked very clear with flags and fences, and yet somehow they'd still managed to jump right over it together. Such was her influence, and his weakness.
She didn't wake when he slowly worked his arm out from beneath her. It was all he could do not to groan as he stood, his muscles aching. There was an echo of familiarity to it. His body hadn't seen use such as the night before in far too long.
He was next to silent as he moved through the dark, dusty house. The only noise to betray his presence at all was the rattle of old pipes as he turned on the hot water. If he'd thought that having a shower and a shave would make him feel as a new person, he was wrong. Refreshed, yes, but his burdens and his gnawing uncertainties did not wash away as easily as dirt, sweat, and blood.
Son of a –
The blood. Thin, brittle veins of it dried on his skin. And instead of shaming him like it properly should, it only served to make him angry. Angry at her for withholding, angry at himself for not noticing. The kid was a terrible liar. He should have –
He dressed carefully, deliberate with the buttons.
The sun was only just over the horizon when he stepped out onto the porch, and immediately he was struck by the beauty of the place. The grass in the field was slick and shining with the night's rain, catching the light from the rising sun with a dazzling brilliance that had him near holding his breath. But he couldn't, no, not when he could greedily pull in each lungful of the cool, damp morning air, smelling and tasting of fallen rain.
The air didn't taste any different. He could almost pretend the sun was the same, lonely as it was. But could he stay?
It wasn't much longer after that heavy thought had crossed his mind that DG joined him out on the porch. Somewhere between the bed and the door, she'd managed to find a pair of pants to slip those pale legs into, and she'd pulled her hair back and tied it at her neck, but little else seemed to have occurred to her. Despite the chill, her arms were bare, and she was hugging herself when she shouldered the door open gently.
"Morning." She gave him a shy smile.
He reached out a hand and she came to him without hesitation, tucking herself into his side with all the practice and grace of one who might actually belong there. It gives him reason to pause, to think, and to keep his tongue from clucking reproach at her.
"Sleep well?" he asked, flagrant with his baiting. Tired as she was, she hadn't a clue.
She gave a nod, but offered nothing further. She snuggled in, getting comfy, and for a fleeting moment he felt terrible for what he was about to do, but she was dead set against running, and – and what about the staying?
"Sore?" He pressed his lips to her temple, held his breath as he waited.
"No," she said, so soft-spoken, "I'm fine."
And there it was. He closed his eyes, exhaled slow. And then before she knew what was happening, he turned them both, pinning her to the rail. His arms on either side, he caged her in. She was left with nothing to look at but his face as he glared down at her, and he saw her visibly quail as she met his eyes, but even that could not lessen his resolve.
"Darlin'," he said, measured, careful.
She set her lips in a grim line, completely uninviting and yet he had no other urge than to lean down and take that sweet mouth with his, hard. But in the light of day, without the ruinous influence of shadow and rain and sinful bare skin, he had a far tighter grip on his control. She looked up at him with those not-so-innocent sky eyes, and it was easy to see, to feel and know why suddenly keeping his impulses in check hardly seemed worth his time.
Her lips curled in a stubborn smirk, and she tipped her head to one side, raising her chin the slightest fraction. The perfect angle, a dare, a trap.
To buy himself time, Cain let go the rail, a white-knuckled grip that had crept up on him when he'd been falling into those eyes of hers. He settled his hands on her hips, and that smirk of hers faltered. With one sure, deliberate move, he slid his right hand from her hip, down the yielding cottony material that covered her. He ran his hand between her legs, easy but firm, and the smirk disappeared altogether as she winced. Her thighs tightened on him, and he withdrew his hand, resting it lightly on her hip again.
"You should've told me," he said, and was surprised to hear the hurt in his voice, betraying the impassive mask he fought to keep on his face.
"You wouldn't have touched me if I had," she said.
His fingers dug a little harder into her hips of their own accord, and he did nothing to correct it. He held onto her if only to steady himself as she continued to speak, struggling with the balance between remorse and relief.
"I didn't want you to push me away. I know it was wrong, but I – I wanted so many times to come to you, and I know you, Wyatt, and you would never, ever –"
"That aside, DG, you should have –"
"I should have done it a long time ago," she said, so fiercely and suddenly that she gasped. Words never meant to be said, but there they were, heated and raw and spoken. She took a deep long breath, and he said nothing, for no other reason than he could not know what could be said, not on his part, no. She stared up at him with her wide, honest eyes and he could not look away, not from so rare and secret a truth as those eyes told. "Cain, when you came back to Central City, I said that I understood why you left me the way you did, but I was lying, to you and to myself. I didn't have a clue, and I was scared you knew it. All I heard was your goodbye. Nothing's changed since then, except that now I think I do understand."
She paused, biting her lip. He looked down at her, incredulous, and it crossed his mind that she was about to take his silence as reason to keep on with her reasoning, and before she had the chance, he brought a hand up to cradle the side of her face, leaning down to kiss her soundly. She opened beneath him quickly, eagerly, and soon his hand had tangled in her hair and the other had slid to the small of her back, pressing her to him. The closeness went to his head as she rolled her hips into his, and he was lost in the tug of her hands and the teasing of her tongue.
"You love me," she whispered raggedly, breaking the kiss to mumble against his cheek. A brief moment of fumbling with his shirt-front buttons and then a cold little hand was slipping inside, running up his chest and around his neck, holding him down to her. She found his mouth again, and kissed him long and lingering.
"Yes," he said roughly, pulling away to search her face. She'd been in his bed, she'd slept in his arms, denial was futile now. No more running. "And I want to take you home."
"I can't –"
"Princess –"
"You want to take me home? I've never felt like I had a home," she said, trying to be light but he could see the pain clear and fresh as day on her face. "I don't think I know where that would be." She bit down on her lip, swollen from his kiss.
"It's not here?" he asked, baiting her again. Shameless, really, but his desire for answers and honesty was being overridden by something far more powerful, and for the life of him, he could not pull away.
"You know it's not," she said, near to sorrowful, "not here or anywhere."
"The Zone is where you belong, DG," he said, and she started to shake her head. "With me," he added, the conviction strong and she stopped moving all together, ducking her head to hide the burn of her cheeks. And like that they stayed for a long time, still and quiet until the fervour had died and she was able to take a deep breath and look him in the eye.
"I want to believe you," she said with a withering edge that hinted at tears. "I'm sorry about – about before. I should have told you."
"And I could have been easier on you," he said, swallowing hard. It was difficult to think reasonably about the night before. He'd been selfish, starved, and he'd only taken. That one sobering thought was crueller by far than any other he'd had since waking, and the peaceful morning around them lost some of its light.
"It didn't hurt much," she said, and she looked up at him with an encouraging smile.
He opened his mouth to speak, but it was at that moment that the sound of crunching gravel broke across the morning birdsongs. He chuckled at how quickly DG untangled herself from his arms and jumped to a respectable distance – still within arm's reach, he noted with satisfaction.
"Or not," she mumbled as she tugged up the neckline of her slim-strapped camisole. Smirking, he reached out and brushed his hand over her breast, still bare beneath the thin material, and his smile became strained as the tip hardened beneath his thumb. She swatted at him, swearing under her breath as she skirted around him and disappeared into the house, calling him a number of foul names in the process.
He was still smiling when the familiar green pick-up pulled into the yard, and had moved to stand at the top of the steps when the old man from the neighbouring farmstead clambered out.
"Some storm last night," Kelley said by way of a greeting.
"Sure was," Cain agreed. "She held up, though." He looked up into the cobwebbed eaves of the porch roof, and gave one of the square support columns a sturdy pat. "Place has been through a lot, but it might be there's a thing or two I can do around here to help out."
"Aye, I'm sure you think so," Kelley said, unconvinced. The truck was between them, a great deal of yard, and the steps besides, but Cain couldn't help but feel the distance was not enough. While it wasn't in him to give one whit about the opinions of others, he sure as hell hadn't come all this way to antagonize DG's precarious existence here. So he let it be – for the time being, at least.
It was a few very long and uncomfortable minutes spent idly walking the length of the porch while Kelley watched like a particularly old and crotchety guard dog, and it was nowhere near soon enough when DG came out of the house, fully dressed and smiling that pinned-on smile. Cain stood quietly back as she skipped down the steps.
"You're here early, Mr. Kelley," she said as she reached the yard.
"Not here to work. Got to head in today, but Marg insisted I come check up on you." He gave his bald head a shake. "She's got it in her head that you're gonna go disappearing overnight –" And here he paused, sighed, and then added, "Again."
Cain was watching DG, and didn't miss the guilty look she shot up onto the porch. "I won't disappear."
True to his word, Kelley wasn't there to continue his work on the house, much to DG's surprise and Cain's relief. He'd only come to do as he said, to check up on the girl to make sure she hadn't run off with the much older stranger who'd shown up out of nowhere and already had tongues wagging down at the Hilltop. To her credit, DG was polite and contrite and charming, all in turns and all at the right times. She was placating the old man, no easy feat by the look of him, and she was doing it so seamlessly that Cain found himself musing on the porch that given enough time, she could probably take him in, too.
It wasn't long before Kelley was climbing back into his truck and driving away, waving at DG as he went, but he didn't seem to have a second glance to spare for Cain, which suited him just fine. He wasn't there to make impressions, he wasn't there to please. He'd come for the girl, and as odd and hollow as it made him feel, there wasn't much else he was concerned about, not just then. There were more bridges yet to cross, he knew, but they'd come in time.
Her company smile was gone when she sluggishly mounted the steps. "He acts all grumpy and put out," she said, "but he's retired and he's bored out of his mind." She leaned back against the support beam he'd been studying earlier, and offered him a smile. "He and his wife have been a really big help since I came back –"
"But they don't know."
She shook her head. "They've got enough respect for Emily and Hank to leave it be, but it's not easy for them," she said, and a smile appeared again. "I just repeat some of Pop's stories most of the time, but Mrs. Kelley knows I'm not telling them everything."
"How'd you manage to explain away droppin' out of the sky?"
"I told them I hitch-hiked," she said, and sighed. "No one saw me come in on the bus, and I don't have a vehicle, and those are the only ways in and out of town, except for your own two feet. The storm put me in a field just a little ways that-a-way." She pointed north. "I was scared I would come in and find out it had sold and someone would be living here. I never thought I'd be coming back to a house without a roof. No electricity, no running water."
She grew silent then, and her eyes took on that faraway look that so often came upon her when memory consumed her. He tried to imagine it himself, the confusion after the storm, the darkness in the house, the emptiness and the echo as she'd moved from one overturned room to the next, stumbling over her memories of the night the Longcoats had come to force her away from everything she'd ever known.
He sighed. He knew a thing or two of walking across familiar ground littered with the shattered remnants of life and home. He'd overcome his memories, his past, and had built anew – or had begun, at least, until the day he'd been called out of his yard onto a road that had ultimately led beyond the edge of his world to a farmstead on a lonely highway and a girl with a ghost or two on her tail. And he knew that of all the things in the world she might want, to be left here with her ghosts and her guilt was the last thing she needed. Experience had taught him that well.
But when had she ever listened to him?
Instead of giving her words and their weight, he gave her the comfort of his presence as he'd done on all those nights now forever behind them. Simpler times, to be certain, even for all the threats looming over their heads then, the unanswered questions burdening them to silence. It would never be that simple again, but here on the Other Side, they had nothing but time to muck through all their complications.
She looked up at him hopefully when he walked over, and leaned into him when his arm went about her shoulders. Not a tremble to her, not a sigh, just contentment and affection and peace.
"Will you help me?" she asked. "With the house, I mean."
"'Course I will."
And when we're done, darlin', he added silently, we're going home.
"Thank you," she said, and her skinny arms curled around his neck. "I'm so glad you're here."
Author's Note: Only one more chapter, my lovelies. Two years! Hell of a trip. Still, time for something new... and don't worry, it's something Tin Man. I don't think I could leave these two alone if I tried. Another Florence inspired chapter title because, really, I don't listen to anything else these days. Thanks for reading!
