The Goliath Protocol

Chapter Forty-Two:

Home

Silver Lake - Montana

He flicked the cigarette. He went back inside. He knew what needed to be done here. He'd done it a hundred times before. You had to sever the tie before it choked you. You had to extract yourself before it brought you down - carefully.

She was in the spare bedroom in a red t-shirt and those damn white panties he was starting to crave on her. All that dark hair around her face was haunting. She tilted her head when she caught him watching her. His mouth opened, and he said, "...you should go."

She arched a brow. Her mouth lifted a little. "Should I?"

He repeated it, "You should go."

Amused, she wondered, "Right now? Should I wake the kids and drag them out into the dark and the cold? You want me to peel rubber and flee?"

He shook his head. She gave him a look of sympathy he didn't want. He didn't want her. He didn't want this. He didn't want any of it. It was time for her to go. When he stood there looking at her, she finally commanded, "Come here."

He shook his head again. Her eyes twinkled with nearly perfect humor, "Coward."

And now? Now he nodded.

She shifted forward. He uncrossed his arms. Her hands slid against his biceps and gripped. He was breathing like he'd run a mile in heavy humidity. He could throw her down and fuck her stupid, but this? This scared him.

It should have been easy. It should have been natural. A friendship that turned into romance. But romance terrified the man who was afraid of nothing. Intimacy was his kryptonite. He avoided it like the touch of it would cripple him.

Jill slid her hand into that flannel to touch him over his chest and that t-shirt. And the flannel?

Soft.

Like she was. Like he was.

Soft.

And scared to death of it.

He started to grab for her like he'd flip the switch to sex, and she denied him. She pushed him back and shook her head. "Go on," She urged him, "Say something mean. Say something dirty. Avoid it."

His mouth was dry, "...avoid what?"

"Me. You. This. Avoid it." She leaned in and taunted against his mouth, "Hurt me to make me go away."

He grabbed her arms. She thought - here it comes- and he shook her. So there it was. He was constantly shaking her. He demanded a little hoarsely, "Stop. You hear me? Stop."

She gave him a cool look. "...you stop."

And here came the next part as he snapped, "Damnit...you're making me be cruel here. What do I have to do? What? What'll it take?"

"Is this cruel? You're never cruel. Crude maybe, and god knows you're angry enough to lash out - but even there...you're not cruel. So try again."

"You want me to be cruel?"

"Why not? Give it a shot."

And then? He proved he could be. "You think I want Chris Redfield's sloppy seconds? Huh? You think I want some woman pining for a fucking monkey without balls? Is that it?"

Quietly Jill told him, "I was never his."

He shook her. She gasped, heart thumping. "Aren't you!?"

"...no."

That damn word. He hated it.

Jill laughed dryly. She urged, "Keep going. What else you got?"

"You think I want some cookie-cutter fucking house in the suburbs with a goddamn dog and a wife in the kitchen baking pies while the kids swirl around her feet like parasites?!"

Softly, she returned, "Yes. I think that's exactly what you want."

Damn her.

He shook his head, and she waited for the smoke from those nostrils. Be cruel; she thought wildly, be cruel, so I'll go away. Be cruel, so I'll run. Save us both.

And then he just...wasn't. He just wasn't cruel. He snapped, "I don't want this. You hear me? I don't want any of it."

"Then let go of me. Let go, and I'll leave. Let go of my arms, Leon, and say goodbye. Make me go. You can do it. You're The Executioner - kill me. You don't need fists to do it or a fucking gun. Kill me and finish me off."

He didn't let go. Her heart knocked in her ribs, reminding her she was alive. Here, at this moment, with a man who was so fucking scared just to love her, she was alive.

Jill tilted her head at him, "What do you want, Leon? What?"

He shifted his hands to her face. He jerked her head back, and his hands twisted in all the goddamn hair she had. Her breath caught. He almost snarled it, "I want you to go. You hear me? Go."

And she whispered, "I'm not the one holding on here. You are."

His hand kept one fist in her hair, and the other looped around her neck, right below her jaw. He could feel her pulse fire rapidly. She gasped, "Go ahead. Easier to kill me, right? Kill me before I get too close. You want me gone? Then make me go."

He tried to kiss her, and she turned her head so his lips slid down her cheek. His hand jerked her face back to him, and Jill hissed, "No."

No...no? No what? No...what!? What did she want here!? What did she want from him? She laid her palm over his heart. She kept it there and held his angry gaze.

"You won't get me that way. Not that way. You want me? You won't get me by hurting me. Stop hurting me, Leon. Stop hurting yourself. Let go. I will catch you, but you have to let go."

She watched the fight all over him. The fight against what he wanted. What he was. What he needed. The fight against her.

She soothed, "...let go, Leon Kennedy...I got you."

Damnit.

Damnit.

The hand around her throat eased. His thumb plumbed into her mouth. She sucked it softly and then kissed the pad of it. The hand in her hair went from tight to gentle. She transferred that mouth to his chin. Butterfly soft. His hands let go of her to fist at his sides.

She tilted his face down to kiss his nose and his closed eyes. He swayed a little and stole her heart. She urged, "What do you need, Leon?"

She slid in against him. Her arms slid around his waist inside that flannel and anchored. She kissed behind his ear. He leaned his head into it and made her heart squeeze in the fist where he held it. He murmured, "...you should go."

Not angry now...scared. So scared.

Jill, in that calm tone that centered him, simply denied him. "No."

He didn't know what to do with that.

Because he didn't want her to go, and he wanted her to go. And he didn't know what the hell he wanted anymore.

But he did. At that moment, he knew what he wanted.

So, he headed her advice...and just took it.

He grumbled, "...damn you, woman."

And then he just...ducked...and almost scooped her against him. Full body. No faking. Her arms shifted around his shoulders. It put her face in his neck and his in hers. Her feet dangled. He put his face into her neck and shoulder curve and just...clung.

And there was that.

That.

The hugging.

He was so goddamn good at hugging.

You didn't get good at hugging without caring. He held on like the storm might toss him out to sea if he didn't.

And he didn't let go.

He held her for so long she thought they might grow roots like trees and be there forever.

And then he left her standing in that room, relearning how to breathe.

He let her go like she was on fire and escaped.

She didn't chase him. She could have. She could have chased him and made him stay. But that wasn't how you won against someone like Leon Kennedy. You backed off. You gave space.

And you waited.

Or he murdered you where you stood.

He was no Chris. Chris was straightforward in his way. He was simple. You asked him to fuck you, and he fucked you, got up, and left. He didn't ask if he'd hurt you. He didn't look for permission. He didn't wonder if he'd pleased you.

He just left.

He didn't try to avoid the intimacy by making it something it wasn't. Because you didn't try to find softness in Chris, any softness he had was saved for Claire. Even in their early days, he'd never been soft with Jill. It wasn't something that came easily to him.

It came easily to Leon. The softness he tried so hard to hide behind rage and regret was in him like a virus, spreading and killing him as it went. Before he'd let her go, he'd squeezed her. Tight. So tight. Like a child who didn't want to let go.

When he'd pulled back, she'd let go, and he'd trailed his lips beside her ear with breath that shook and hitched. But he didn't ask her to go again. He didn't tell her to leave.

He left.

When he reached the door, she said softly, "Run. I'm still here."

He hesitated. His back stiffened. He laid a palm on the frame of the door. She waited.

But he kept on going.

She'd wanted him to come back. She'd never wanted Chris to come back. She wondered if he'd ever understand the difference. She wondered if he'd ever understand her.

So, she stood in that room and breathed.

He taught Logan to fish. He took the kids hiking. He didn't ask her to go again.

Jill stood on the porch watching him attempt to teach Logan flips. The boy tried, he fell, he grunted. He went back at it. The pride on Leon when he landed a back tuck had Jill smiling.

Eva somersaulted and shouted, "I did it! I is a crack robot!"

She probably meant an acrobat.

Leon studied her on the ground and mused, "I can probably do that."

Eva squealed, "Nev'ah! You is fat and old!"

Logan announced, "I can do it!" In mid-roll, Eva shoved him over onto his side and whooped, "Hah! You losed!"

She braced her hands on her hips and declared, "I is duh most wiggly - likes a worm...or a fish!"

Leon snorted and shrugged. "Can you do this?"

And then? That slippery son of a bitch just ran into a series of tucks and flips that left those kids looking like they might have spotted Santa Claus becoming a ninja. Logan shouted, "Holy moly! Are you dizzy!?"

Leon came out of the last flip and staggered. He gave them a thumbs-up before Eva shouted, "Look out! There he blows!"

And so he had no choice but to fall on his face on the ground.

Taking advantage of him, Logan tied him up with shoelaces, and Eva plopped on his back to announce, "It is fishbit!"

She probably meant finished.

"Kilt by babies! Snow thirsty!"

She probably meant no mercy.

Leon tested his bonds and decided, "Not bad for a kid." He gave Logan a shrewd look, "Somebody teach you to tie knots like a champ?"

Logan smiled and returned, "My Mama."

Jill jerked on the porch. Another thing she'd taught him that she couldn't remember. Would she ever? Would she ever get that lost time back? She was working for it, but it was slow going.

When Logan and Eva made Leon 'walk the plank' and pushed him into the fish pond where he flailed about like he was drowning and made them shout with laughter, Jill wondered if it mattered. Would it matter if she never got it back? What if she just...made new memories right here...right now...with this man in this house and these children?

She just had to get the man to stop running.

That was easy enough with the children. He was in and all in with them.

She'd once figured there was no halfway with a man like him. She was right. There was no halfway. He just...gave it everything he had. Once committed, he jumped in with both feet and fists flying.

He still resisted her like she was on fire and he might go up in smoke, but he took to those kids like a fish to water.

Jill wondered if she might look into adopting Eva herself. She knew the family waiting for her was so good, just good people and well-liked by Claire. It would hurt them to lose the little girl they were waiting on.

But Leon...would he come back from it?

Either way, she'd unlikely get clearance to adopt the girl. She wasn't exactly stable. Nobody would think she was ready for one child, let alone two. And maybe she wasn't. All she knew?

Leon was. He was a man-made for family.

However long they had here, she'd keep trying to give him one.

Logan spent the days outside following Leon around to learn about ranching. Leon taught him everything he wanted to know. The kid was a sponge, absorbing and filing it away. It was hard to believe he shared a brain with Redfield, who mostly looked about as absorbent as concrete.

The kid was a natural on the range - popping off shots and consistently hitting somewhere close to his target. He had a good stance and seemed to know his way around a shotgun. Again, Leon thought, Jill most likely - teaching without remembering she'd done it.

Leon watched her struggle with her own recovery. She would take long walks and return solemn and remote. She'd flip the switch to smiles and laughs when the children were around.

She taught Eva how to ride a bike and chased her down the drive while the little girl shouted, "Fwee at last! Fwee at last!"

Leon brought her a drink when Jill was sitting on the porch smoking one night. He set it on the arm of the rocking chair, and she took it, whispering, "...thanks."

"Sure." He struck up a smoke as she two-fisted the bourbon and threw it back.

Quietly, she invited, "You wanna sit down?"

He shook his head: no. Jill encouraged, "You still want me to go?"

He shook his head: no.

Apparently, no words were just as good as too many sometimes.

"...you're doing a good thing here, Leon...with these kids."

He glanced down at her and didn't like the haunted shadows under her eyes. He wasn't sure he was helping her. He knew memories kept cropping up everywhere for her. He wanted to make it easier on her, but it was her fight. He couldn't do a damn thing.

Having the kids around helped them both - he knew that without considering it. Between Logan being a brilliant little blue-eyed sponge of awesome and Eva being the most adorable thing on two legs, it was hard to do anything but soak up their innocence and forget your own demons for a moment.

So, he wondered, "What about you? Is this the right thing for you?"

She held his eyes and answered, "Yes."

He nodded. He paused before heading back inside, hesitated, and then laid a hand on her shoulder. "...stay as long as you need."

The door snapped closed on him as he left. Jill sipped her bourbon and felt the tears in her eyes. Progress, she thought; he wasn't running. She wasn't running. It wasn't perfect, but it was better.

When he was gone, she put her face in her hands and wept. She always did it alone when no one was around to see it and judge her. She did it when he was too far to hold her and take her pain into his own.

She didn't know if there was hope for her, but there was hope for him. She'd keep offering it to him until he found his faith to become what he was meant to be.

What was that?

Not a legend. Not a warrior.

A man. Just a man with something to live for.

Because he'd given her that just by existing.

In the kitchen, he watched her cry softly into her hands - still hiding. He breathed. And he called, "Logan?"

The boy poked his head out of the game room where he was currently defeating Eva at ping-pong. "I think your Mama needs a hug."

Eva whooped and shouted, "Time for duh love!"

She shot out the door. She threw herself at Jill on the chair, and the woman caught her with a laugh that felt so pure it made his eyes close for a moment. A hand curled around his, and Leon looked down as the boy stated, "In the dark sometimes...we'd hold hands when things got too hard."

His heart jerked as he smiled a little, "Helped, did it?"

"Always. It's ok to hold hands, Leon...when you're afraid."

"Logan...when you're afraid...and you will be, more often than you think...it's ok to ask for help."

Logan held his eyes, and the look in all that blue was so wise it was almost frightening. "Do you?"

Leon gave him a sad look. "Not as much as I should."

"I'm here, Leon. I will help you."

Leon squeezed his hand. "It might be too late, buddy."

"It's never too late," Logan told him wisely, "You just gotta say the words, I think."

Damn kid. Nearly as smart as his Mama. Softly, Leon invited, "What do you say we make some pizza?"

The boy perked up and grinned, "With pineapple?"

"...don't be a heathen, boy."

Logan chuckled. Leon glanced out the window to find Jill holding Eva on her lap while the little girl told her a story about the frog she'd seen that farted rainbows. Her eyes rolled to the window. She caught his through the glass, shook her head, and gave him a little nod.

He answered it before announcing, "Alright, heathen, let's make fake pizza."

Logan laughed, and it got a little better.

Eva and Logan made wigs out of mops and food coloring. He wore them and performed. He was an actor - and this was his audience. But there was no careful consideration and corporate ass-kicking here.

It was just a guy, wearing a red and purple mop and a stupid sack that might have been a dress, playing his guitar and singing for laughing children.

Apparently, he knew twelve languages, a hundred ways to kill a man, and how to spear pleasure from groin to ground...and kids movies. He knew kids' movies. He performed like nothing she'd ever imagined. He was a Disney character, a troll, a ninja...whatever they wanted.

If you knock knock me over, I will get back up again.

The words suited him. They suited her too. He made the kids squeal and fall over with amusement. He made a pretty cute troll. He lifted his angry fat orange cat like the Lion King in the air.

He had a cat named Fatty. The guy who didn't have anything worth losing had a fat ugly cat with a smooshed face. The cat wasn't happy to be the Lion King, but he dealt with it.

He put them through their paces like a drill sergeant singing that song from Mulan about making men out of them.

He dressed up as Harry Potter and let them shoot sticks at him with fake spells. Always over the top. Always dramatic. He threw himself over furniture and fell down hills while they chased him, screaming with victory.

He sniped them from the roof with a Nerf Gun.

In the dark.

Like he had on night vision goggles.

He got Logan in the butt as he ran, and the boy fell to the ground, rolled, and yelled, "Oooof!"

Eva screamed high and fake, hiding behind a tree, "It's over! Oh, it's over! Heeeeelp! Kilt by a hexan-poopener!"

Jill judged the distance to the roof. She waited, and his hair flashed in the moonlight. She urged the girl in a dramatic whisper, "Run and make a lot of noise. I will take him down."

Eva puffed up her chest bravely. "...sneaky."

Jill winked. "Sneaky. Can't get a poopener any other way."

Eva looked wise as she replied, "...yes. He kilt Logan. He is tough...I can do dis." She whooped and ran through the trees, taunting, "You stink! You will ne'ber get me!"

Jill cocked her Nerf Gun and snuck through the shadows. She put her back to the wall. She heard his gun go off, and Eva shrieked wildly. She barely kept herself from laughing.

Eva called, "You missed! You is bad at this! I am still alibbbbe!"

Leon called back, laced with amusement, "I hit you twice. How are you still alive!?"

"I is a vampire!" She made a creepy voice when she shouted it.

Leon returned, "...shit. My greatest enemy. Where is my stake and garlic?"

Eva giggled loudly. "I eated your stinky gartflick. Now I burps fire!"

Leon shouted in terror, "No! I'm wearing my wood underwear! I will burn!"

Behind him, Jill stated, "Oh, you won't get to the burning, hotshot. You're done."

She shot him twice in the back with the Nerf Gun. Eva cheered on the ground. Logan laughed where he was supposed to be dead. Leon flung himself forward and slid across the roof dramatically. Jill put her foot on his chest and declared, "No more Executioner! Let's make him a vampire!"

He cried, "No! Save me!"

Eva returned from the ground, "Nev'a! No mermaids!"

Jill crouched over him, and he grinned, "She might mean no mercy."

Jill stuck her gun against his chest and made him grunt. "...boom. Heart blow."

His teeth flashed in the dark.

He figured it was worth it. Shot in the heart by the Surgeon.

It was a good day to die.

They put up a tent and slept out under the stars. The kids talked so much about constellations and warriors in the lights. Eva shouted, "I sees Beercules!"

She probably meant Hercules.

She pointed, nudged Leon, and announced, "You is the same.

Logan added his two cents, "He was a hero who didn't want to be either."

Surprised, Leon glanced down at him, and the boy remarked, "He had powers but just wanted to be normal."

Jesus, this kid. Leon held that knowing blue gaze, and Eva decided, "He was old and fats too."

Leon laughed. Evan plopped in his lap, and Logan joined them at his side to lean against his arm. Jill joined them on Logan's other side and looped her arm around his shoulders as the boy told them, "Sometimes...you have to fight gods, I think to be normal."

Jill glanced at Leon over the children as the boy continued, "But gods can die, ya know? You just...gotta find their weakness."

He was either a genius or had that wisdom brought about by sheer innocence. Leon, quietly, wondered, "What about heroes?"

"Sometimes heroes die," Logan decided.

Eva added, "But nobody ev'ah fo-gets dem. Because the live fo-eva in duh stars."

Leon shook his head, "...you two are too damn smart for me."

They laughed. His arm slid around Logan's back and rested on the small of Jill's. She kept hers around the boy's shoulders but laid her palm on Leon's thigh. And they kept looking at the stars while they wondered if heroes were ever really forgotten.

She went walking after midnight. He waited on the porch, watching the smoke curl up around his hand to his nose. She disappeared down by the lake.

When she didn't come back after an hour, he left the kids in the charge of his housekeeper and followed her path. He could track a fart on a foggy day; he could find this woman on his land.

He didn't have to look far. She was in his graveyard.

When he came up behind her, she simply said, "You should tear this place down."

He said nothing.

She glanced back at him and added, "This place is an homage to horror, Leon. Why hold onto it?"

"To remember."

She nodded. She looked like she accepted his sage wisdom. Her eyes flicked around the hollowed-out shell of what had once been beautiful. "It feels like Raccoon City here."

Quietly he replied, "Yes."

She turned toward him. The wind tickled their hair and ruffled the contrasting colors like careless fingers. She held his eyes and demanded, "Show me."

He tilted his head, and she nodded, "Show me what you do here. Show me."

He shrugged. And he showed her.

She watched him go, roll, run, fall, tuck, and recover. He kicked, he hit, he fought, and the rage on him - it was haunting. It whispered on the wind like the hissing promise of a devil on your shoulder.

She caught his fist with her own when he rolled through a landing and sprang to his feet like he'd pummel the air. It thrummed. He huffed, "I could have hit you and hurt you."

"...no."

He rose from one knee, and she let go of his fist. "I could hurt you."

She tilted her head at him and demanded, "Then hurt me."

He swung. He was fast. So goddamn fast. He drove her back. She retreated, parried, and rolled. She blocked and ducked. They sweated, sparred, and pulled punches so they wouldn't wound the other.

It was like exorcising demons in this graveyard of his.

As she skidded over the ground on her side, she commanded, "Stop holding back! Take me down...if you can."

He stopped playing around. He came at her like he'd kill her. She kept one step ahead of him, using the environment he created against him. Smart, he thought with respect as she hid among the ruins of a building, wise not to engage him directly. She knew she couldn't win in a knock-down-drag-out fight.

He eased through shadows and tucked corners in silence. When he tossed a rock to create a little diversion, he listened to the wind for her answering change of positions. As he rose from his crouch and slid around a corner, he found her there with a rock aimed at his eye like a gun.

Impressed, he tilted his head, "Clever. What'd you use to make it seem like you were on the other side?"

She gestured to her missing jacket flapping in the wind against the edge of a ramshackle chunk of wall.

"Well done."

They breathed heavily, studying each other. And he finished the compliment by stating, "But pointless."

She opened her mouth, and he knocked her hands up from beneath before she could stop him. As she swung back to stop him, he caught her wrists, jerked her into his body, and jerked the rock from her grip. She made a grunt and whispered, "I could have shot you before that."

"Maybe. But if you hadn't?" He caught her throat in his hand and slammed her into the wall. It wasn't easy. It was rough. Her breath caught as he put the rock to her forehead and finished, "...boom."

Jill held his eyes as a fat plop of rain hit his forehead. She breathed, "Executioner. Go ahead...finish me off."

His chest heaved from fighting. Hers answered. Sweaty, worn out, and rolling with adrenaline - they stood there entranced by the other. His eyes jerked over her face before he dropped the rock and let her go.

The rain cast a halo as it hit and steamed off his face as he invited, "Come back home, Jill...it's getting late."

Home.

Was it? Was anywhere home for her?

She stood there and watched him walk, but he didn't leave. He waited. He waited at the edge of his own graveyard until she joined him.

And then he stayed by her side the whole way back to his house.

Home. Sometimes it was wherever you found yourself...no longer alone.