Three the Hard Way by Sydney Croft

over at Ian, whose interest was now fully engaged as he watched them, his feet kicked up on the wooden crate that doubled as a coffee table. He still wasn’t wearing a shirt, and his fly was unbuttoned. He might appear to be one laid-back son of a bitch, but behind those heavy lids, sharp eyes were cataloging everything, and under that firm, tan skin, his body would be coiled and ready for anything.
    “You fucking selfish shit.” Justice stepped closer to him, his fists clenched at his sides. “I handled everything from a distance because you told me to get the hell out of your life. Do you think I didn’t lose as much as you did that day? Do you think it was easy to leave you? I begged you to go with me. I fucking got down on my hands and knees and offered you anything you wanted, including my soul, if you’d just join me, and instead, you told me how I was betraying you and our mothers’ memories.” His tone had degenerated to a serrated growl so full of rage that Tag could practically feel it burn his skin. “How dare you talk about betraying them. If you’d listened to me when we graduated from high school, if we’d left then for ACRO instead of trying to hide our powers and play at being normal college students, our moms might still be alive. ACRO would have welcomed them too, and they’d have been safe from Itor. They’re dead because of you , Tag. Their deaths are on you, and—”
    With a roar, Tag laid out Justice with a right hook that dropped the other man to the floor. Justice’s face was hard as hell, and pain screamed through his hand, but he didn’t give a flying fuck. All he knew was that the wounds that had just been opened were too overwhelming to deal with.
    Eyes stinging, hand hurting, and his heart cracked wide-open, he grabbed his parka and gloves and stormed out of the cabin and into the frozen wilderness to cool off.
    Fuck Justice. Fuck ACRO. And while he was tossing fucks around, fuck Ian. Tag should grab his snowmobile and get out of here now.
    Problem was, he could run for the rest of his life, but he would never outrun Justice’s words. They’re dead because of you, Tag.
    Four years of denying exactly that was bearing down on him with the force of the earlier avalanche. Four years of hiding from the truth in the isolation of Alaska or in the anonymity of the Florida Keys—before Itor had gotten ahold of him, anyway. But even Itor had given him an excuse to pretend that he wasn’t responsible for their mothers’ deaths. He’d been busy being tortured or threatened or forced to kill. He hadn’t had the time or energy to relive the past and remember how, if he’d only joined ACRO instead of going to college to live a normal life, his mother, and Justice’s mother, would still be alive.
    So yeah, as snow stung his face and wind froze his eyes, he felt the crush of guilt he’d held off for so long. But unlike the earlier avalanche, this was going to bury him.

    Well, that had been a hell of a show.
    Ian drained half of his beer as he watched Justice peel himself off the floor. The ACRO agent swiped blood from his mouth with the back of his hand, muffling the litany of curses that fell from his swelling lips.
    Lips Tag had kissed. A lot. As recently as an hour ago.
    “That was pretty harsh, man, blaming Taggart like that.”
    Justice snarled. “Fuck you.”
    Ian shrugged. “Just saying. I’ll bet he already blames himself for your mothers’ deaths as much as you blame him.”
    And wasn’t that interesting? Tag had told Ian that his mother was dead, but he’d said it’d happened in a car wreck with Justice’s mom. But then, Ian had believed Justice was a normal dude, and Tag couldn’t have just come out and said, “Hey, this evil agency called Itor killed my mom and Justice’s mom, and then he ran off to ACRO.”
    Nope, on the rare occasions where Tag had talked about his past, he’d said Justice had run off to join the military.
    Ian would have preferred military.